[throwaway_law]

There are...you can download any tax form for free and fill it in by hand or in a PDF program.

You will see articles regularly attacking TurboTax because SV has been wildly unsuccessful in producing a startup that can compete with TurboTax, so instead a lot of effort is spent attacking them in the media.

Google, Microsoft, Facebook all spend significantly more on lobbying to ensure market hegemony. Don't be surprised at the pattern, attack TurboTax in the media, then up pops a new startup that will disrupt the industry. Rinse and repeat.

[dangus]

I disagree with this simply because the idea that competition exists or could exist is not an excuse for the system to function the way it does.

There are new players in the space, like CreditKarma. Many competitors offer more features for free than Intuit as well. But that doesn’t mean we should have to rely on private companies (who are data hoarding) to file our taxes. That doesn’t mean that free fillable forms need to be unnecessarily more difficult to use than commercial solutions.

In reality, the IRS already has all the relevant forms reported to them. For most people the IRS could send a tax form already filed out to read, verify, and return. For business owners and other more complex situations, these are still the same people who are already hiring a tax accountant and are probably skipping TurboTax as it is.

In other words, commercial tax preparation software for most users is filling an artificial need that only exists because the government has been lobbied not to provide the (basic) service itself.

[throwaway_law]

> That doesn’t mean that free fillable forms need to be unnecessarily more difficult to use than commercial solutions.

They aren't. The IRS form is the exact for completed by TurboTax or any other accountant/service provider. The IRS only accepts their own forms.

>For most people the IRS could send a tax form already filed out to read, verify, and return.

Thats what is really being asked...the Government to do tax returns for you for free. Even if TurboTax and accountants weren't lobbying the Government not to do taxpayers tax returns for them for free, its a major jump to say the government/IRS would unilaterally begin doing this for taxpayers as a free service.

[dangus]

Telling us that the end result of the form is the same is meaningless. You don’t fill out the form manually on TurboTax. It automatically imports W2 information, it asks layperson’s questions, and generates the final form.

If you do this yourself, it’s far more time consuming.

I don’t understand why you think it’s a major jump for the IRS to provide this service. Other countries already do this. Other federal agencies also provide complex web services like My Social Security and Healthcare.gov.

The IRS already has your W2 and 1099 data. The IRS already knows when you make a mistake, automatically, often live as you e-file. I have had e-files rejected instantly due to mistakes. They clearly already know how much I’m supposed to owe them.

[NoGravitas]

Well, the government was clearly interested in providing free online filing, back around 2002. But they were lobbied out of the idea by Intuit and a few other companies in the tax prep space.

[journalctl]

Nice editorializing. TurboTax is actually maligned (as plainly stated in TFA) because of their lobbying efforts to keep tax filing difficult.

[mywittyname]

I can just imagine the YouTube advertising campaign...

> Do you hate doing you taxes? Try Simple, we made it easy! Just put in a few personal details and we'll take care of all the rest. We'll download your W2 information from your employer and send it to the IRS. With our Simple Guarantee, you can feel confident that your return will be correct.

Or maybe we could call it Tophat. That's a good tax software name.