{"id":27349,"date":"2012-04-10T19:05:53","date_gmt":"2012-04-11T01:05:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/04\/10\/making-income-taxes-easyer.html"},"modified":"2012-04-10T19:05:53","modified_gmt":"2012-04-11T01:05:53","slug":"making-income-taxes-easyer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/04\/10\/making-income-taxes-easyer.html","title":{"rendered":"Making income taxes easy(er)"},"content":{"rendered":"

While I am a very pleased customer of Intuit for doing my current taxes (since they make the process 1\/10 the effort of paper forms), their political pressuring in this case is despicable (if economically understandable) — similar to arguments by politicians that the NWS should only provide data to private firms like Accuweather who will then sell it back to the public.<\/p>\n

I suspect my taxes are complex enough that I couldn't just "pull it up and click OK," but getting the basic data in would make a tremendous<\/i> amount of sense. #ddtb<\/p>\n

Reshared post from +Kevin Fox<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

California has been piloting a tax return program called 'ReadyReturn' where the state pre-fills your tax return based on the W-2s and 1099 it already receives, giving taxpayers a big head start in completing their returns. Who's the biggest opponent? Intuit, who stands to lose a lot of business if doing your own taxes becomes easier.<\/p>\n

The worst part is Intuit's official statement when asked about their opposition:<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re a California company and actively participate in the political process,\u201d said Julie Miller, a company spokeswoman. \u201cOur position has consistently been that ReadyReturn duplicates what is already available.\u201d<\/p>\n

Translation: We provide jobs and we donate to candidates. Making things easier on taxpayers hurts our business, and we'll back candidates who keep taxes confusing.<\/p>\n

Ick.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\n

Embedded Link<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tDigital Domain – On Tax Returns, Why Enter What the I.R.S. Already Knows? – NYTimes.com<\/a>
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tMany developed countries, though not the United States, offer tax returns containing data the government already knows.\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

While I am a very pleased customer of Intuit for doing my current taxes (since they make the process 1\/10 the effort of paper forms), their political pressuring in this case is despicable (if economically understandable) — similar to arguments by politicians that the NWS should only provide data to private firms like Accuweather who … Continue reading “Making income taxes easy(er)”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[106],"tags":[107],"class_list":["post-27349","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-plusposts","tag-ddtb"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":11049,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2007\/04\/18\/waiting_to_the_last_momen.html","url_meta":{"origin":27349,"position":0},"title":"Waiting to the last moment","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 18-Apr-07 3:52pm","format":false,"excerpt":"I have, on occasion, done my taxes on the 15th, but it's always sweating bullets because, well, heck, who wants to worry that TurboTax's site will be impossible to access...","rel":"","context":"In "Hi-Tech"","block_context":{"text":"Hi-Tech","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/hi-tech"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":130423,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/04\/14\/the-irs-should-do-your-taxes-for-you.html","url_meta":{"origin":27349,"position":1},"title":"The IRS should do your taxes for you","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 14-Apr-16 5:14pm","format":false,"excerpt":"This wouldn't directly benefit me, because we always end up itemizing deductions, but for the 70% of taxpayers who don't, it boils down to this: since the IRS already gets all the info you do on your income, if you're just taking the standard deduction, why don't you get a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5283,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/04\/12\/taxing_experien.html","url_meta":{"origin":27349,"position":2},"title":"Taxing experiences","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 12-Apr-04 11:44pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Just plowed through TY03's returns with relatively flying colors, thanks to the folks at Intuit TurboTax. Some of the infamous \"tax cuts for the rich\" benefited the Hill\/Kleerup household, others...","rel":"","context":"In "Potpourri"","block_context":{"text":"Potpourri","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/potpourri"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":32925,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2013\/03\/27\/theres-always-someone-out-to-make-a-buck.html","url_meta":{"origin":27349,"position":3},"title":"There's always someone out to make a buck","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 27-Mar-13 1:21am","format":false,"excerpt":"I make use of TurboTax, and probably still would even if the IRS were providing me with my reported income information (which information they already have.) \u00a0But Intuit is acting here, not on behalf of poor, benighted taxpayers who might be swayed into thinking that a pre-filled form from the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7579,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2005\/01\/31\/engulfdevour.html","url_meta":{"origin":27349,"position":4},"title":"Engulf+Devour","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 31-Jan-05 2:21pm","format":false,"excerpt":"In Mel Brooks' Silent Movie, the antagonist was a big corporation known as Engulf+Devour (a play on Gulf+Western which had recently acquired Paramount). I always think of that when I...","rel":"","context":"In "Big Business"","block_context":{"text":"Big Business","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/big-business"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":137788,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2019\/02\/09\/gop-argues-revealing-trumps-taxes-might-lead-to-more-tax-transparency.html","url_meta":{"origin":27349,"position":5},"title":"GOP argues revealing Trump's taxes might lead to MORE tax transparency!","author":"***Dave","date":"Sat 9-Feb-19 1:12pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Egads!Actually, the most interesting item the article is that public tax return info has plenty of precedent in US history, and tax returns being sacrosanct is a relatively modern phenomenon in the US. Gosh, wonder what group made hiding sources (and amount) of income the norm? GOP Warns Releasing Trump\u2019s\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27349","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27349"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27349\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}