
Filing Taxes in Japan Is a Breeze. Why Not in the US? - Cbasedlifeform
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/14/opinion/filing-taxes-in-japan-is-a-breeze-why-not-here.html?ref=opinion&_r=1
======
patio11
The NTA (National Tax Authority, cited as the Kokuzeicho in the article)
doesn't figure out your taxes for you. Your employer does, as one of the
(many!) ways in which they exercise paternalistic control of your life. If you
do not have an employer, you get to go through a process which is almost
exactly as fun as it is in the US, modulo a modestly competent online filing
application.

I spent $3k this year on accountant time to file my personal taxes. The
majority of the cost is driven by my various extracurricular activities. In
the five years where I did my own taxes as a self-employed person, I generally
lost between 2 and 5 working days a year to the effort, largely driven by the
"calculate the income and expenses of your self-employed business" part of the
return.

A Japanese corporation with one employee is in for about ~$5k a year of
professional services fees incident to managing payroll for that single
employee, not counting the taxes themselves. (I personally can't wait until
this space gets Gusto-ed here, and SmartHr and other companies are starting to
get there.)

~~~
feld
$3k??! How is that possible? I get personal and business taxes done for $200

~~~
bemmu
As another data point, I also pay $2k - $3k / year for help to file taxes in
Japan. But I also know many people who just do it themselves.

My justifications for paying:

\- We've done the return ourselves once, but it was stressful to worry about
not completely understanding everything and making some expensive mistake.

\- Service in English.

\- If tax officials ever wanted to ask me something, they would get responses
in Japanese from a person who actually knows what they are talking about.

\- Nice for making sure I get every deduction.

\- Probably just doing the "blue form" return is already worth the expense
because of deduction benefits. I probably wouldn't ever get around to figuring
out how to do that.

The process in Japan seems reasonable, but seems to me more convoluted than in
Finland. I was particularly surprised how you have to pay many different fees
which in Finland would have been bundled together. Namely having separate
bills coming on varying payment schedules for income tax, municipal tax,
entrepreneur tax (5%) and health insurance. This seems inefficient and
confusing to me.

~~~
jacquesm
> I was particularly surprised how you have to pay many different fees which
> in Finland would have been bundled together. Namely having separate bills
> coming on varying payment schedules for income tax, municipal tax,
> entrepreneur tax (5%) and health insurance. This seems inefficient and
> confusing to me.

That's how it is in most countries because they're all different entities
collecting.

~~~
chimeracoder
> That's how it is in most countries because they're all different entities
> collecting.

Exactly. I pay city, state, and federal income tax in the US. My city is about
1.5 times the population of Finland, and that's only one of the three
different forms of income tax I have to pay. At least that goes through the
state, so it's only two departments, but that's again separate from the
federal IRS. And that's _just_ income tax, not other taxes I have to account
for and pay as well.

The reason it's more complicated in countries like the US, Japan, India, etc.
is because they're much, much larger, which requires more complexity to manage
- both the size of the government itself and the revenue-collecting
departments that need to support it.

If I only had to pay taxes to my city's revenue department and there were no
state or federal tax in the US, I can guarantee that the process would be a
lot smoother for me as well.

~~~
krzyk
In Poland municipal, state and federal income taxes are paid as a single entry
on the tax form. The government then transfers the money to the appropriate
lower level of authorities.

So I wouldn't say that most countries differentiate like in the states.

Maybe it is a Europe - USA difference?

~~~
uiri
As an additional data point: provincial income taxes in Canada are collected
along with federal income taxes by Revenue Canada and then remitted down to
the provinces. The sole exception to this being Quebec.

Definitely a peculiarity of the US system being less cohesive than some other
countries - and also dealing with far more people and jurisdictions.

------
pharrlax
Overlooked in this article and comments is the influence of one man -- Grover
Norquist.

He runs an extremely influential organization that administers a sort of
purity pledge that, for most Republican candidates for Congress, is necessary
to sign in order to avoid being primaried.

He has decided that making taxes easier to do would make people more okay with
tax increases, and so he has decreed that support for the kind of systems
other countries use is a violation of this pledge. His excuse is that such a
system would effectively slightly increase taxation by preventing people from
getting away with taking erroneous deductions. This excuse is obvious, total
bullshit.

Grover Norquist wants taxes to be painful because he wants people to dislike
government and the concept of taxation in general. Thus, Republicans in
Congress must take the same opinion or risk having their purity stamp revoked.
Thus, no reforms get passed.

Perhaps this is one area Trump can do some good; certainly he's much less
beholden to the traditions that bind the old guard (for better or for worse).

~~~
narrowrail
Norquist started Americans for Tax Reform (ATR) is a politically conservative
U.S. taxpayer advocacy group whose stated goal is "a system in which taxes are
simpler, flatter, more visible, and lower than they are today."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americans_for_Tax_Reform](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americans_for_Tax_Reform)

Doesn't sound like you are describing Norquist's organization they way they do
in their mission statement. Do you have any references?

~~~
greggman
it's a matter of perspective . making taxes more invisible to some people,
myself included, makes them easier to raise.

so, the argument would be to first make taxes more painful. the best would be
to remove auto withholding. if the average $50k a year family had to write a
check for $3k to the government every 3 mouths they'd likely push much harder
for lower taxes. less taxes means less money for government which would seem
to mean smaller government. once the taxes are low and government is small you
can simplify the tax code.

I'm not saying I agree with that or that I could ever actually happen but I
don't see a flaw in the logic and why their own description of their mission
can both say they are for simpler taxes and also be against the kind of
simpler the linked article is about

~~~
mgkimsal
not sure what area they're in where a $50k/year family pays $12k in taxes. NY?
CA?

~~~
Mr24601
Nowhere. $50k a year family probably only pays $5k a year all in including ss.

~~~
spc476
I just looked it up [1] and depending upon filing status (single, married,
head of household) the tax on the net taxable income of $50,000 (after
deductions, expenses, etc) is between $6,576 and $8,278. $12,000 in taxes
don't start until $65,000 net income.

[1] [https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i1040gi.pdf](https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-
pdf/i1040gi.pdf)

------
jschulenklopper
I don't know when the slogan of the Dutch tax authority, "We can’t make paying
taxes pleasant, but at least we can make it simple" was introduced, but in my
view it has been supported in three different ways:

1) a simplification of the tax rules - mainly by reducing the number of
exceptions and tax deduction rules,

2) filing the tax forms digitally - they started with desktop applications,
and now the main focus is on a web application, and

3) pre-entering the information the DTA already has on you, so you just need
to correct and add missing information instead of entering everything from
scratch - and they collect a lot of data of you yearly.

This improvement happened over the last 15 years, and the time required to
filing tax returns was reduced from many hours (mainly to gather all the
information, and writing it on a paper form) to like 30 minutes. That is, if
your administration is up to date. Filing the tax forms is my yearly reminder
to update my administration...

BTW, that slogan is stated more succinctly in Dutch: "Leuker kunnen we het
niet maken. Wel makkelijker."

~~~
tluyben2
It is still no krentebol to work with taxes in NL. Better than most places but
if you have a company it still is way too much red tape. I am very much for
paying taxes and I would not even mind overpaying if it were a lot simpler.
Here in Spain it is hell: I know why it is that but it makes not declaring far
more attractive so we Dutch did something right. Still it is way too much
hassle, especially for the small amounts.

~~~
jschulenklopper
My experience with business taxes is very limited (just simple revenue taxes),
so that could be a lot more complicated in many cases indeed. There are still
sufficient numbers of accountancy and tax firms in NL, so it can't be simple
in all cases. I was referring to personal income and property taxes.

------
eloisant
It's a breeze in France too. Login to the government website, verify that
everything preloaded is correct, add the few things they don't know about and
you're done.

It's a mess in the US because Turbotax and others make money on that
complexity and do lobbying to keep it that way.

~~~
cjhanks
I am not sure I get it... it took me less than 2 hours to enter my W2's,
import my brokerage liabilities, and insert my itemized deductions.

All for about $60.

You know what would be worse than that? A system which has absolutely no
competition or financial incentive to improve....

~~~
sveiss
You're making a false comparison.

The majority of UK residents don't need to file a tax return. The correct
tax/national insurance/student loan deductions are withheld from their
paycheques, and in case of problems, a phone call will normally sort them out.

Some people need to file returns. (Those that don't need to can also choose
to.) Those people that do can file on paper, though the Government website, or
using third party software. There's around 30 listed software providers for
personal tax.

The fact most people have never seen a tax return in their lives hasn't
prevented competition for tools in the more complex cases.

------
bogomipz
This is short and worth a listen, a Stanford Professor spent a year or so of
his life piloting a program in California called "Ready Return", where the
government filled out your taxes for you. Ultimately it was shot down by
Intuit and H&R Block's lobbyists however.

[http://www.npr.org/2017/03/29/521954033/stanford-
professor-l...](http://www.npr.org/2017/03/29/521954033/stanford-professor-
loses-political-battle-to-simplify-tax-filing-process)

~~~
dingdongding
And Republican lobbyist also. Their reasoning was "We don't want to make
filing taxes simple, because if they become so people will stop hating taxes"

~~~
thescriptkiddie
I honestly can't think of a better example of how broken American politics
are.

------
ekblom
This years it took me about three minutes: log in, scan throug the numbers,
sign to accept. Then i went for a coffee. That how we do it in Sweden.

~~~
jamesblonde
I typically reply 'yes' to the sms to do my filing in Sweden.

~~~
reitanqild
Similarily simple in Norway. (But I have a _small_ company so I will typically
add revenue and expenses into it before confirming it.)

------
i_feel_great
In Australia, via the mygov tool, for a simple wage earner like me, 10
minutes. All the payroll taxes amounts are prefilled, maybe 10 questions in
all. Got my refund in ~ 10 days. The Australian Tax Office has a fairly
extensive developers program to encourage more/better tooling and compliance.

Edit: The ATO developers programme:
[http://softwaredevelopers.ato.gov.au/](http://softwaredevelopers.ato.gov.au/)

~~~
Sir_Substance
BTW, the refund is a super-cool thing about the Australian system that may not
be super-widespread. The Icelandic system is a very similar pay-as-you-go tax
system, so tax is predicted and withheld from your wages over the course of
the year.

But Iceland errs on the side of under-withholding, if they don't know what
your income is going to be. As a result, come tax time, most people get a
letter saying "you owe us 60,000isk"[1], and they pay it back as extra money
garnished from their wages over the next year.

The Australian government errs on the side of over-withholding, which sounds
bad, but it's more like a mandatory saving scheme. Most people discover the
tax office has over-charged them by at least $800 over the course of the year,
and you get it paid to you in a lump sum after they process your tax return.
After deductions are filed, it's not unheard of for people to get 4-6k back.

As a result, for most people in Australia, tax season has a bit of a party
atmosphere to it. You'll find people talking about what they're going to buy
with their return, and there are sometimes tax season sales on things like
TV's etc.

It's a really great example of a small and seemingly unrelated implementation
detail making or breaking the whole experience.

[1] about $600, figure example only :P

~~~
sidlls
I view over-withholding as an interest free loan to the government. No thanks.
I'd rather underpay by 1% than overpay. For me 1% is over $100/mo. I'd rather
earn interest, dividends, whatever on that and then pay the balance.

~~~
II2II
They seem to over-withhold in Canada as well, and I disagree with it for
similar reasons.

On the other hand, it is likely a huge benefit to the poor and those who are
poor at managing their money. Come tax time, they could easily face a bill
that exceeds their paycheck and paying interest on top of their taxes. It
would also cost the government more since they would have to pursue collection
more aggressively.

~~~
_delirium
They tend to overwithhold in Denmark as well, mostly because it avoids having
to chase down people for payments later (giving people refunds is easier and
fully automated). However they do pay interest on the overwithheld amount.

------
msound
On a related note, a Stanford tax law professor Joseph Bankman had run trials
of pre-filled forms for a few California state taxpayers. Listen to his
journey on Episode 760 of PlanetMoney podcast:

[http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/03/22/521132960/episo...](http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/03/22/521132960/episode-760-tax-
hero)

TL;DR:

* 99% of people liked the pre-filled forms

* He took this idea to California state congress, but Congresspeople were "warned" about him by Intuit lobbyists

* He hired his own lobbyist but lost by 1 vote in the Congress

Edit: Grammar

~~~
nightski
ReadyReturn sounds like it only works if you have an extremely simple tax
return. While that is great, I don't understand how the people with a simple
W-2 are having such a painful time with taxes. It takes about 5-10 minutes to
finish a simple return. What am I missing?

~~~
kelnos
Assuming you're using tax prep software, you still have to click through all
the stuff that doesn't apply to you, and it behooves you to at least skim the
text to be sure that law changes haven't changed anything for you this year.
Just the act of clicking "no" on everything will probably run you a good 20
minutes, with another 5-10 of actually entering your W-2 data and supplying
payment information.

~~~
monster_group
You do not have to go through all the questions if you know your tax
situation. It is only for people who are clueless about their tax situation
that they have to go through all the questions. If you know you are going to
take standard deduction there's no point in going through the entire list of
itemized deductions only to find out what you already knew.

------
FiatLuxDave
I've taken to referring to the time that I spend filling out US Government tax
forms as the "Norquist tax". After all, it's hours of my time which I have to
spend giving work to the government.

Maybe if we all start calling it that, Americans for Tax Reform will realize
that they are causing more harm than good by lobbying against a more efficient
filing system. They may think that having us spend a bunch of time doing our
taxes makes us better realize how much taxes we pay. In reality, it's just
another form of government waste.

------
maccard
I'm in the UK. If you work as a regular employee, your tax gets automatically
deducted and noted in your payslip. Each year you get a form posted out and if
you disagree with the amount (I don't know anyone who ever has) you can
contact HMRC to sort out the difference.

If you work as a contractor/self employed, you have to fill in a self
assessment form. I personally don't need to do one, but my partner did, and it
took us about 30 minutes last year.

It really doesn't need to be this complex.

~~~
reallydontask
HRMC will actually tell if your employer(s) have screwed up and you're due a
refund.

I imagine that they will also tell you if you need pay more for the same
reason, but that's never happened to me.

~~~
mstade
They _might_ tell, and if they do it's probably not something that's going to
happen swiftly.

I took a job with an employer in London who didn't get my taxes right, but I
was none the wiser of course. A few months in, my tax increased by a
significant amount from one paycheck to the next, and this tipped me off to
something being wrong. I talked with my employer who looked in to it, but this
kept on being the same for about three months. At this point, I'd been on the
job for maybe 7 months or so. Finally I'm told I have to sort this out with
HMRC myself, so I called them. They were very helpful and pleasant to deal
with, and the person on the other end of the phone call very briefly looked
over my account and determined I've been overpaying every single month – by a
lot. They noted as well that HMRC had indeed changed my tax code to an
"emergency rate" or some such about three months prior to the call, but failed
to note the wrong tax code that was already there in the first place. This
person did sort it all out however, and a couple of weeks later I got a check
in the mail for over £6000.

It did finally work out in the end, but I'm not sure I would've noticed if
they hadn't hiked my tax so significantly, and I don't know what would've
happened then since apparently they hadn't registered the error either.

Moral of the story: HMRC are there to help, but you may want to be proactive
and call them if you think anything might be wrong, or you want to double
check something. Their phone service is very helpful, and usually not too
busy.

~~~
dmi
I had exactly the same situation while at a startup, which got spotted by
myself ("Woah why did my taxes jump?") and my employer ("What's this weird tax
code?"). Getting it fixed with HMRC was almost trivial, and the refund was
very nice.

Years later, I moved to the US. I'm sure it's probably less bad if you've
grown up with this system, but I still have no idea what to change (or by how
much) to make sure I don't owe taxes next year. I don't understand how to play
the tax game, so I'm pretty sure I'm paying much more than I should.

However, a friend has an interestingly different approach: pay as little as
possible in taxes throughout the year, set aside what you estimate your tax
burden will be, keep the interest, and pay it all in one lump sum at tax time.
They refer to this as "not giving the government an interest-free loan".

Edited to add: I never thought I'd say this, but... I miss HMRC.

------
oakesm9
In the UK the majority of people do absolutely nothing. Your wage slip says
how much tax you've paid each month (through the PAYE system) and then at the
end of the tax year your company sends you a P60 form
([https://www.gov.uk/paye-forms-p45-p60-p11d/p60](https://www.gov.uk/paye-
forms-p45-p60-p11d/p60)) which is simply a pre-filled summary of all the tax
you paid that year.

That's the case for anyone with the most common case of a single salaried job.
If you have a more complex situation (dividends from company share, taxable
investments, multiple jobs) then you need to fill in a self-assessment form. I
did one last year and it was all done online and took about an hour in total.

------
oppositelock
The tax code is too complex, which is why it takes so much work to correctly
compute what you owe. It doesn't matter whether the tax payer does this, or
someone does this on their behalf to make it "easy". Taxes should be simple to
pay because they're simply structured.

In the US, Congress derives much of its power from tweaking the tax code, it's
how campaign contributions are rewarded. Do this for a hundred years, and you
get a complex tax code. This is also why it's not going to be simplified
anytime soon, since Congress will never vote to reduce its own power.

------
IkmoIkmo
Here in the Netherlands my employer's data is all pre-filled in. Just have to
log in to a mobile app and sign with my citizen's digital ID. (just a login
with 2FA).

All of that takes about 3 minutes, and it's pretty much sufficient for like
80-90% of my peers (fresh out of college).

But with more complex deductions, you need to use the 'full web app', which is
also pre-filled but comes with tons of questions. They take me about 20-30
minutes, because I know how it all works nowadays. But the first time it took
me 2 hours cause there's lots of definitions and words that aren't frequently
used in the Dutch language.

~~~
golergka
Wait; employees have to fill taxes themselves?

Why?

~~~
jschulenklopper
Employers withhold part of your salary - I think it's a fixed percentage based
on the height of the salary - and pay that to the tax authority.

Yearly, citizens file their taxes, giving information that the employer
doesn't have or does not take into account (like gifts to charity, partner
income, mortgage interest paid, health care related costs, tax paid on
dividend, ...) that results in more or less taxes that should have been paid.
After receiving that tax-related information, the DTA calculates what you
should pay additionally, or whether you get some of the taxes paid back.

------
jkaljundi
[http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-
meter/statements/2015/jun/...](http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-
meter/statements/2015/jun/04/jeb-bush/jeb-bush-says-estonians-can-file-their-
taxes-five-/) [http://www.businessinsider.com/estonia-efficient-tax-
filing-...](http://www.businessinsider.com/estonia-efficient-tax-filing-
system-world-2012-2)

------
rayiner
I love paying my taxes, and I kinda like the baroque U.S. process. Every
April, I spend a couple of weeks being salty that government is penalizing me
for being married, penalizing me for not taking out a giant loan to buy a
McMansion in the suburbs, taking my money and using it to bomb Syria instead
of helping working class families, etc. If my taxes just got auto-paid, I
don't think I would even think of these things, and I don't think that'd be a
good thing.

~~~
actuallyalys
Did you learn about those problems from doing your taxes, or does doing your
taxes just remind you? If it's the latter, a prefiling system would serve
almost the same purpose.

------
oblio
In Romania if you don't have any income except for your salary, you don't have
to do anything. Yes, there are no tax exemptions or deductions, but on the
other hand life is simple.

How often are those exemptions or deductions worth it, especially when
compared to the potential complexity and additional cost of a byzantine tax
system?

~~~
fierarul
> there are no tax exemptions or deductions, but on the other hand life is
> simple

There is talk nowadays about changing this and bringing in deductions, just
like in the US.

------
philsnow
pre-filled forms will probably help a largeish proportion of americans who
have dead-simple taxes.

once you start doing absolutely anything else (having a side job, renting out
property, participating in the stock market, having income in multiple states,
etc etc etc), you're in the byzantine territory of
income/deductions/credits/AMT where nearly every line on every form involves
reading the instructions for that line (and yes, nearly every line has its own
instructions) and reflecting on your life to decide whether you think that
purchase qualifies as a deduction, or what percent of your car's annual
depreciation you can allocate as a business expense, or whether you need to
declare your 2014 California refund as income on your 2015 Oregon taxes. Money
ping-pongs around, getting taxed coming and going (you pay tax on your salary
and tax again when you use that money to pay for gasoline (and a very few of
these taxes are multiplicative instead of additive, so you can in fact pay tax
_on the tax you're paying to buy gas_)).

I'm really not doing justice to the intricacies of the tax system. I would
really enjoy reading a James Mickens tribute to it.

Pre-filled forms aren't going to help navigate the insanity, unless the
governments (federal and all the states) have access to data about every
transaction, every penny that flows through your household.

~~~
emodendroket
Ok, but the vast majority of American households never have to worry about any
of that.

------
dagenleg
The beauty of free market is that it can create markets where there otherwise
would be none. Once you normalize lobbying in your society, possibilities are
virtually limitless.

~~~
oakesm9
Is it really a free market if you need to stop one party (the government)
doing something to keep your market?

~~~
dagenleg
Why would you want to word it like that? Let's not call it 'stop' but rather
'financially discourage'.

~~~
oakesm9
I meant is it really a free market when Intuit needs to pay off the government
through lobbying to stop them making tax filing simpler so they can keep their
market.

~~~
PeterStuer
Yes. Others are 'free' to pay more to get candidates elected that would
simplify the tax return. The 'beauty' of concentrated benefits and distributed
pain is that the organization overhead combined with the real but sufficiently
diluted pain for each individual sufferer sort of pre-empts this. This is why
in these so called 'free' markets you end-up with all these complete absurd
situations at the societal level.

------
spangry
Does the US have a employer withholding system (i.e. if you get paid $1000 in
a week, your employer withholds and remits whatever the pro rata amount is for
$52,000 annual income to the Tax Office)? We have that in Australia, and it
definitely simplifies the process for workers at the end of the year.

Personally, I've always liked the idea of a 'standard deduction'. People with
a steady paying job for the whole year, and simple tax affairs, don't have
much of a reason to fill out a tax return given how much data our Tax Office
pulls in from other sources (e.g. your bank interest gets pre-filled). The
longest part of the whole exercise is claiming all those little work-related
deductions here and there. For most people I don't think this ever exceeds
$1000 total.

So if the government just gave everyone a default $1000 deduction, combined
with pre-filling, filing a tax return for most people would be a simple matter
of looking at the summary and hitting 'agree'. You could even take it one step
further: if you don't fill out a tax return the government assumes you agree
that your default return is correct.

We almost had this in Australia [0]. It was a measure in our 2010-11 Federal
Budget [1], but we didn't go through with it for.... reasons...

[0] And there's good reason to believe it would have radically simplified
things. I recall 'tax agents' really hating the idea for some strange reason.

[1]
[http://www.budget.gov.au/2010-11/content/bp2/html/bp2_revenu...](http://www.budget.gov.au/2010-11/content/bp2/html/bp2_revenue-06.htm)

~~~
fblp
Yes, the US does have an employer withholding system but there are so many
more layers of taxes and complexity because the taxation system is less
federalised.

In Australia there is a single federal employment tax, and a single federal
sales tax. States and counties typically collect property tax and fees from
services.

In the US both the federal and state governments collect income tax. The tax
rates and deduction complexity varies widely between the 52 states. Then the
states AND counties (districts) have different sales tax rates. California
alone has over 1790 districts each with sales taxes set at a local level.

Not to mention capital gains, Medicare tax etc...

Then the comparatively high lobbying, wealth inequality and inefficiencies in
the US political systems makes tax change very slow or regressive.

*I'm an Australian living in the US

~~~
spangry
Wow, that's a lot of complexity! I remember the various state sales taxes when
I visited the US a few years ago (that weren't built into the menu prices).
Between that and tipping, I swear Americans must be absolute guns when it
comes to quick mental arithmetic.

On the tax complexity, at least on the bright side the only direction is 'up'
from here :)

------
chadlavi
What I find truly amazing about the tax situation here in the US is the sheer
unpredictability. You the employee are burdened with choosing the right
formula to deduct taxes from your paychecks, but there is no ironclad way to
ensure that you deduct only the exact right amount—or to check whether you've
been deducting enough. For most people, tax time comes and either they get a
bunch of money back (they deducted too much), or they owe a bunch of money
(they deducted too little). I'd rather just have exactly the right amount
deducted.

Some people choose to not deduct any, and put a guesstimate of what their tax
bill will be into savings, so that they can make some tiny amount of interest
on it over the course of the year, then when tax time comes, pay just exactly
what's owed. But this feels like playing with fire to me.

~~~
delecti
> Some people choose to not deduct any [...] this feels like playing with fire
> to me

Well it should, because it's not really legal. If you aren't having taxes
automatically deducted then you're expected to pay quarterly estimated taxes.
And if you should have been having taxes automatically deducted and underpay
by too much, then there's a fine associated with it.

~~~
monster_group
>And if you should have been having taxes automatically deducted and underpay
by too much, then there's a fine associated with it.

And interest!

------
strictnein
The reason American taxes are more complex is that both parties use the income
tax system for social engineering. They want to encourage things like home
ownership, attending college, having kids, donating to charity, etc, so they
let you deduct related costs.

~~~
jmulho
Modifying the tax code is also the easiest way to accomplish redistribution of
wealth (for better or for worse). This is at least in part because the
complexity of the tax code obfuscates the cost of the program. For example,
should we continue to fund the budget of the "Department of Benefits for
People with Spouses Born Before January 2, 1952"? Who benefits (how many and
by how much)? What does this program cost? Nobody knows. There is no such
department. Instead there is a check box on line 39a of the 1040. Checking it
might change the standard deduction, for people who take the standard
deduction, if they checked some other boxes, "see instructions".

------
hyperliner
US tax payer here.

I'm going to stay away from discussing TurboTax from a political perspective.

However, I have used TurboTax since the first year I had income. It's super
easy. As my income has gotten complex over time (from simple, one employer tax
return to multiple employers in a same year, real estate, investments, and
office expenses), I have found TurboTax worth the $90 or $100 it costs to
purchase the software every year. I always purchase the $40 "Audit Protection"
and have never used it: not once I have been audited.

It does take some investment of time. You need to read the questions, learn to
figure out the forms that you get from banks, and be careful in inputing your
data. But a lot of the sections are skipped anyway. I learned to stay away
from buying stocks that are partnerships (pain the behind to do during
TaxTime, not worth the hassle if you can find alternative stocks). TurboTax
remembers my last year's numbers and that is also super easy. It helps me stay
informed and keep responsibility for my tax situation and make my own
decisions on what to do next year without "the government or the employer
doing it for me."

I have always had the temptation to go to a full service (H&R Block, or some
of the higher end ones offered by my bank), with the idea of maybe discovering
that I have been overpaying all these years! But I have never done it, mainly
because of concerns on identity theft. Today, all my data is in my computer
and the only time the data leaves my network is when I send it to TurboTax for
e-filing. This could also be avoided if I printed it and mailed it, but I
rather not take my chances with lost mail.

I did have some large income a number of years back due to a sale of a
company, and I was doubting myself about whether I was "paying too much." I
simply asked folks around me, and they told me "nope, you are good" as the
cash was distributed as regular income in my W2.

All in all, TurboTax has served me well. My investment is a total of about 10
hours or so spread over a few months. Every time I get a new form, I go to
TurboTax and input it. Sometime around March I wrap things up and file.

~~~
strictnein
I've had the same experience. I just collect the various forms I get mailed in
a little bin next to my computer, and when I do my taxes it takes two hours
max. And that's with a fair amount of deductions, IRA/retirement
contributions, and a side consulting gig. Usually spend $100-$150 with them
based on my needs that year, including the audit protection.

------
alkonaut
I file mine by ticking a checkbox and signing with the normal national digital
id app. This is Sweden.

I do not understand how the hell this is still so complicated in the US. Just
change it?

My impression of politics and authorities is "if something is obviously broken
then it's already worked on and probably fixed within a year or two".

The reason crap isn't fixed in the US? Beats me - but I'll guess: because a
lot of people don't want it fixed. And those people contribute money to
politics. You have a political system where _money_ can be used to campaign
for political office. Fix _that_.

~~~
kspaans
To give you a small example: the deduction for moving expenses[0]. If you move
for work (plus some other small conditions), you can deduct those expenses
from your taxable income. This can't be claimed for you automatically, you
have to ask for it. To automatically file your taxes would very likely mean
you miss this deduction. It's the legions of (arguably) boutique tax credits
like this that crank up the complexity of filling. Individually most of them
are reasonable, but it would be hard to take them away because they are likely
to be used by a lot of people (the mortgage interest deduction for homeowners,
for example).

0 -
[https://www.irs.gov/taxtopics/tc455.html](https://www.irs.gov/taxtopics/tc455.html)

~~~
alkonaut
We have those - but the system is constructed to be simple. If a not
insignificant part of the population is eligible for some deduction, then
either a) ensure it's automatically registered or b) remove the deduction or
raise tresholds until everyone can again file automatically.

For example, interest rates, pensions, charities, home improvements etc are
deductible and automatically deducted since e.g the bank or charity reports
the interest cost or donation etc. Travel to work is deductible but the
treshold for making the deduction is so high that few can claim it.

The key is to design the tax system so that it is easy to file. A deduction no
matter how fair and reasonable that would make thousands have to file
paperwork doesn't make sense.

~~~
mcherm
But you are overlooking the fundamental underlying problem. You didn't mention
whether the "easy to file" tax system would be an advantage to Democrats or
Republicans. Without knowing that, it is impossible to assess any piece of
legislation.

~~~
alkonaut
Wouldn't it be a benefit for most taxpayers, and only a drawback to a small
minority of taxpayers and companies involved in e.g tax law or tax software?

If a law is merely about bureaucracy and is neutral in terms of e.g tax
pressure of redistribution then any political resistance must surely be
because of some kind of unwanted influence from an organization or company?

------
CalRobert
Just filed my FBAR and every year it feels like the requirements change so
they have a reason to convict you of something. This year they just moved the
due date up by a few months for no apparent reason. I'm simply lucky that I
happened to do it now (I normally procrastinate until June); that's a good
$10,000 fine if they believe it was accidental; $100,000 otherwise.

I'm fine with taxes, but filing taxes in the US is utter bullshit.

To give credit where it's due, though, the state of California has free online
filing (Calfile) , which is nice.

------
wobbleblob
“We can’t make paying taxes pleasant, but at least we can make it simple.”

I actually don't mind paying taxes, because I can see around me every day that
the money is mostly put to good use. I can imagine if I lived in a place where
there were little or no public services, bad public schools, bad
infrastructure, five digit annual college fees, polluted tap water, power with
frequent blackouts or brownouts etc, I'd be pissed off with my tax bill too.

~~~
ajosh
It sounds like you are describing different communities with different
problems (i.e. Flint, MI doesn't have problems with frequent Brown outside -
that was California 15 years ago) as though they are the same one. Also, most
of those examples are things from state governments rather than the federal
government. Of course, people don't talk much about state tax reform. State
tax revenue sources can vary from property taxes to income tax to sales tax.
Some states don't have an income tax and reply mainly on sales tax.

------
monster_group
I hate doing tax paper work like everybody but I would rather do it myself
than let government do it. When I do it myself I am very careful to make sure
I have gotten every possible deduction. If I let the government do it, most
likely I will wait until the last day to review it and then I would say 'yeah
looks right' without doing due diligence. If the government makes mistake of
omitting a deduction or two on people's tax return then people would complain
how government is trying to rip them off by deliberately omitting deductions.
I also hate the complicated tax code like everybody else but that is a
necessary evil I believe. US has large variations in income/wealth and one
size doesn't fit all. The fact that tax code is complicated is actually an
indication that there are tax breaks available for most people in many forms.
US taxes are much lower than European taxes. It is easy to simplify the tax
code by taxing everybody 30-40% like European countries. I would rather have a
complicated tax code that results in lower taxes than a simple tax code that
results in higher taxes.

~~~
random_comment
The complexity of the tax code is completely unrelated to the cost of running
your country, which is what taxes have to cover.

Increased complexity doesn't mean lower taxes or higher taxes, in principle,
it just means complex taxes.

In practice, it actually leads to higher taxes to pay for an army of people to
check the code is being applied correctly.

In Taiwan they have a system where you can choose to do manual deductions (A),
if you think that's in your interest. Or you can take (B) 'the average
deduction+10%'. Then you have a 1-page declaration of your income, no
deductions marked, but they calculate what the guys who use (A) get, take the
average, add 10%, then knock that off your tax bill.

No false claims, no evidence to supply, nothing to check, both sides win, each
tax official can manage 100x as many Bs as As.

It's a practical example of how simpler tax codes can result in lower taxes by
reducing (needlessly) big government.

~~~
monster_group
You can do that in US too. You can take itemized deduction (similar to A you
mention) or you can take standard deduction which is flat amount (similar to
B). But the US government lets you apply many more deductions after taking
either of these and that is where the complexity comes. You can choose to do
just itemized or standard deductions in US and not bother about other ways of
saving money and then your taxes will be simple like Taiwan. That's your
decision.

~~~
random_comment
> But the US government lets you apply many more deductions after taking
> either of these and that is where the complexity comes.

I feel you've missed my point. Most countries offer the ability to consolidate
some deductions into a standard deduction.

But in Taiwan they consolidate ALL the deductions, as far as memory serves;
and the way they do it isn't a fixed amount (e.g. 5%) but the sum of what the
other people achieve who go the long route, plus a bonus.

So literally it's 1-page 'sign here', or a complex form.

And it's literally a statistically 'guaranteed' win if you make things easy on
everyone (average + 10%).

The US doesn't offer anything like that.

------
shoshin23
In India, most people I know use ClearTax. It's freemium(the last 3 years I've
only used the free version, that was enough.) and I spent only about 20
minutes or so every year filing my taxes. Everything becomes super simple with
Form 16, given out by my employer. And apart from this the government has an
e-filing system but I've never used it. ClearTax was enough.

------
danjoc
I'm the only American I know that does my own taxes. I've never paid anyone to
do them. I've never use software to do it. I print the form, and fill it out
with a pen. It only takes me a few minutes. I even filed my own C corporation
taxes once long ago. I'm not a CPA or tax lawyer or in any line of work
related to taxes.

~~~
kelnos
My handwriting is terrible; I'd at least want to use a form-fillable PDF, and
having the ability to copy/paste figures between forms and a digital
calculator would make me feel better about not making arithmetic or
transcription errors.

I used to use TaxAct to do my taxes, but unfortunately they aren't simple
enough anymore that I even feel comfortable using that without making a
mistake. I just got my completed return back from my CPA the other day, and
there are (required) things he did on there that I definitely would not have
known how to do, even with the prompts in tax-prep software. If I had to
puzzle through IRS form instructions, it'd be even more of a mess.

I actually did decide to look up one of the more confusing things my CPA did
by reading some IRS form instructions, and it confused me beyond belief. I
asked him about it and his explanation sounded reasonable, but there's no way
I would have figured it out on my own. The US tax system is so messed up.

~~~
danjoc
>I'd at least want to use a form-fillable PDF

I used to do those, but honestly, it's just easier to do it with pen and
paper. Either there is automath in the form that screws up if you fill in a
field out of order, or they make the form so it cannot be saved. PDF editing
software sucks too. It's very unfriendly on Linux. I would suffer through it
when I used OS X, because I worried about legibility in the small boxes. I'd
never go back to that now. It's a huge pain. The pen is mightier than the
keyboard with tax forms.

------
mnm1
All other developed countries have no problem doing ________.

Why can't the US do _________?

Lobbying.

Works for simple tax returns, healthcare, labor laws, unionizing, etc.

~~~
nebabyte
The only justification I've ever heard for why lobbyism should be legal is
"lobbyists act as 'lawyers' to help the people be heard in the legislative
sphere".

If that were true, "if you cannot afford a lobbyist, one will be provided to
you" would be a thing (and no, I'm not talking about crowd-funded 'patches'
like the public funded NPOs/watchdogs protecting our rights).

As far as I'm concerned it's functionally equivalent to straight-up bribery.
Accomplishes the same ends for the same people, just sidesteps the definition.

~~~
elihu
It's hard to distinguish "lobbyists" from "a group of concerned citizen
activists advocating for a cause they care about". Any rules imposed on the
former would also affect the latter.

More robust restrictions on the flow of money from lobbyists to campaigns and
superPACs could be an effective deterrent on the worst influences of
lobbyists, though.

------
basseq
I did some work for the IRS several years ago to explore the same idea. There
are many benefits, including simplicity and accuracy of filing (closing the
$500B tax gap), as well as better fraud protection (another $25B).
Protectionism of the tax return industry is common, but not the primary
reason. Instead, the biggest pushback is from taxpayer advocacy groups. The
issue is this: for many Americans, particularly low income Americans, their
tax refund is the largest check they receive all year. Delaying that refund in
order to receive all tax information (e.g., from banks and employers) and pre-
populate a tax return would push back initial refund checks by 1-2 months.
This is tantamount to political suicide.

More detail:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14004152](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14004152)

------
Waterluvian
I don't have the most complex tax situation: a wife, child, income, capital
gains. But it takes me maybe 15 minutes in Canada to do.

I once screwed it up and they fixed it for me, yielding a larger return than I
calculated (I accidentally zeroed the RRSP contribution carry over value).

Thought maybe this would help give perspective of what can be.

~~~
sqeaky
Is there anything Canada isn't best at?

I once heard a (bad) joke. If you are in Canada and hold the door for a group
of 5 people you can expect 7 "thank you"s.

Well that's just a joke I thought, there is no way people are polite anywhere.
So I decided to act on this little limerick and compare it to Nebraska
manners. At a few restaurants, in home town of Omaha, I tried holding the door
for groups counting the "thank you"s. The first group of 5 gave me 6 "thank
you"s.

I thought that was actually pretty good, but it is not an experiment without a
control. I had a friend going to Canada and asked him to try it. Sure enough
the first group of 5 gave him 7 "thank you"s.

~~~
thro1237
Now, that is a good joke

~~~
sqeaky
Thank you, Thank you.

------
andrewla
Ah, this takes me back -- one of things that I really liked in Obama's 2008
campaign [1]:

> Simplify Tax Filings for Middle Class Americans: Obama will dramatically
> simplify tax filings so that millions of Americans will be able to do their
> taxes in less than five minutes. Obama will ensure that the IRS uses the
> information it already gets from banks and employers to give taxpayers the
> option of pre-filled tax forms to verify, sign and return. Experts estimate
> that the Obama proposal will save Americans up to 200 million total hours of
> work and aggravation and up to $2 billion in tax preparer fees.

[1] [https://web-
beta.archive.org/web/20080402203402/http://www.b...](https://web-
beta.archive.org/web/20080402203402/http://www.barackobama.com/issues/economy/)

~~~
zeveb
Pity that didn't work out. No doubt the tax industry's lobbyists earned their
pay on that one …

------
mbroncano
Sorry, but no: the US doesn't lead in this issue either. Filling in taxes here
is worse that going to the dentist.

It's embarrassing as well to witness so many Americans to dismiss what's
obvious for anybody having lived abroad. The tax system here sucks donkey
balls. Background: lived and worked in three different countries, filled in
taxes everywhere by myself. Sometimes with a dictionary, and never was so bad
as in the US, even with Turbo Tax.

No, it's not only tax filling. No sir: immigration system, health care,
education ... failing to admit the US lags far behind the (rest of the)
civilized world is the surest recipe for worsening the situation.

Get smart, America. You're for a big surprise when you wake up to a world
that's surpassed you already in most issues.

------
jaysoncena
I'm not sure how easy it is in Japan but in Singapore, It just took me 10-15
mins to file my tax. 1\. Login to IRAS(tax bureau) portal using the national
ID (for me as foreigner, I used my employment pass ID) 2\. Open the page for
filing income tax 3\. I entered total annual salary and allowances 4\. I have
donated to a government-recognized charity and this is automatically reflected
on the form. It seems that the charity uploads donation infos to IRAS 5\.
Check if the tax relief for having a child is there 6\. Click submit 7\.
Review and re-submit

You also have an option to do installment, deducting from your bank account
monthly.

I don't have any other source of income so it will be different for other
people.

------
ivan_gammel
Ex-Russian here: this year I had very pleasant experience with FNS to declare
and pay income tax for some extra income (13% flat rate btw). 5 minutes on the
web site just to declare the money they were not yet aware of, click submit
and choose payment method (could be cash payment in any bank, credit card or
via integration with lots of banking APIs - my choice). Few more minutes after
I figured out there's a small old debt on property tax, that they never
bothered to collect, to pay it too. They started with rather complex desktop
app and continuously improved UX, so now it's really good. Worth to mention
that they have 2FA option with security token.

------
markvdb
Belgium is interesting. The forms are really complicated, but luckily largely
prefilled forms for most (salary and pension income, mortgage related
deductions, ...).

Apart from the complexity, the problem here is the extremely slow return of
what the government owes you.

For 2016 income: * filing between 20170426 - 20170630 * final calculation by
post ~20171101 - ~20180401 * return of overpaid amount ~20180101 - ~20180601

The Belgian revenue service almost always overcharges on obligatory
prepayments. Refunds happen only at the end of the process. That means an
ordinary Belgian citizen gives a free loan to Belgian government for ~12-18
months.

~~~
mstade
In Sweden you used to earn interest on money in your tax account, but I think
the current government removed that this year so now it's a free loan to the
government.

In some ways, the tax account was a better place to put money than a bank
account. There have been periods where the interest on the tax account was
competitive compared to banks, so some people would pay a years worth of taxes
up front, and come tax season reap the benefits in terms of higher returns.
Since they'd already paid all their dues, they'd pay nothing each month and
the tax man would just reconcile things monthly as the tax comes due.

This isn't as palatable today when there's no interest, but I know some people
still do it because it means their take home pay each month is "higher" in the
sense that taxes aren't deducted, because they've already been paid. I've
considered doing it, since while it makes no difference in the amount I pay,
it means I have more cash in hand at the end of each month, rather than having
amortize the tax cost over the year. Obviously this only works if you put away
that money elsewhere somehow, taxes still have to be paid after all.

This also reminds me of a trick a buddy once pulled in the U.K. He paid all
his taxes to the wrong account, but it was still in the hands of HMRC. Then
when the tax man came knocking, he just showed his payment receipts and HMRC
noted the error, fixed it up and apologized for he inconvenience. As well,
he'd be paid back interest earned on this money, because the account he paid
into had a higher interest than the one he should've paid to, which may have
had no interest – I don't quite recall. I don't know if he still does this,
but he did it by mistake one year, saw the benefits and figured it wasn't
illegal so he just kept doing it. If there's anyone here that knows what I'm
talking about I'd love to hear you thoughts!

------
glenneroo
In Austria, we only have to file (online) every 5 years, and even that is
somewhat optional. If you don't do your taxes, the only loser will be you,
since you might lose out on getting some cash back.

------
mvidal01
This is a very interesting story about a Stanford professor that tried to get
California to pass a law to make paying state taxes easier.

[http://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?story...](http://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=521132960)

More: [https://priceonomics.com/the-stanford-professor-who-
fought-t...](https://priceonomics.com/the-stanford-professor-who-fought-the-
tax-lobby/)

------
kartan
Today I filed taxes in Sweden for the first time.

1\. Sign-in from Bank-id at Skatteverket

2\. Review pre-populated amounts

3\. Digitally sign acceptance filing with Bank-id

If I just have one salary from one employer all year round, why should it be
more complicated than this?

~~~
mstade
It shouldn't, and in Sweden it obviously isn't – I think it's great! But the
moment you start doing things slightly out of this norm, maybe you rent out
your apartment for some time, maybe you have capital gains, maybe you were
paid dividend as a small business owner... it gets complex real fast.

Skatteverket is a pretty knowledgeable organization though, and quite friendly
when you have questions to ask so I recommend giving them a call if you need
things clarified. They've helped me out a lot simply by educating me when I've
called asking all sorts of dumb questions.

As much as I dislike paying taxes, the process of doing so is anything but
inconvenient in Sweden.

~~~
random_comment
Also, tax calculations in Sweden are easy.

Q. How much money should I pay in tax?

A. All of it.

:-)

------
tantalor
I don't mind the idea of figuring my own taxes, after all I can lookup all the
numbers pretty easily, but the main obstacle to that is the tax instructions
are impossible to parse.

We should require the IRS to release the tax forms in a machine-readable
format, e.g., as open-source software. The human-readable instructions should
merely be the spec. Other people can write nice interfaces on top of that.
Then you can run the code on your phone to figure your taxes.

~~~
msound
In India, our income tax department accepts returns as an XML document, and
tax prep software developers have built tools that basically help you generate
the XML and upload it to the e-filing website.

PDF Link:
[https://incometaxindiaefiling.gov.in/eFiling/Portal/StaticPD...](https://incometaxindiaefiling.gov.in/eFiling/Portal/StaticPDF/Schema_Document.pdf)

Other than this, the government run e-filing website also has a nice interface
to do your taxes. It's fairly simple. Just fill in numbers and click Next Next
Next Submit, and you're done.

------
inetknght
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13990391](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13990391)

------
partycoder
For income tax return, many countries offer the possibility of filing a tax
return that is pre-filled with information available to the tax revenue
service.

For a person with simple reporting requirements, like only one source of
income from a job, and no foreign income (99% of tax returns), the most likely
required action is to just accept the proposal and file it... all done for
_free_.

------
faebi
How much of those time savings and costs are beeing moved from the employee to
the employer? How much simpler is it for the companies?

------
tbihl
Obligatory EconTalk for people who want to better understand US taxes and
popular perception of them:

[http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2017/04/vanessa_william.htm...](http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2017/04/vanessa_william.html)

------
ominous
offtopic: Is this a new thing? Double clicked a word to try and select it, and
the text changes size. Windows 10, Firefox.

Up there with "smooth scrolling", "clipboard hijack" and making me type
something in the browser console so I can use javascript. Annoying.

~~~
geon
It's not doing it on Chrome/Mac.

I guess it is about as annoying as menu elements changing size on hover.

------
alexmingoia
Because like healthcare Americans are governed by lobbyists and ideology. US
tax law filing complexity is a flagrant violation of due process but the
Supreme Court refuses to hear the many cases they've received.

------
oarla
Isn't there FreeFile on IRS's website which allows someone with a simple
return (no capital gains, only standard deductions etc) to file for free. It
would be as simple as described in this article.

------
coldcode
Perhaps it would be easier to have the government collect all of our income,
subtract the taxes, and pay us the difference once a year. That would be even
simpler.

~~~
lolsal
How would I take advantage of pre-tax money, like contributing to retirement
accounts, HSA, ...?

~~~
sveiss
Here (UK) it's taken care of by the provider for most people.

If you were to pay £80 into a personal pension (similar to an IRA), about a
month later an additional £20 would be added. That's tax relief at the 20%
basic rate. (Higher rate payers currently need to file to claim additional
relief, but there's no reason that couldn't be automated too.)

If you had a company pension instead (similar to a 401(k)), you can pay in
through salary sacrifice, where the salary your tax is calculated on is
reduced and the difference paid directly into the pension scheme.

Whichever route is taken, the end result is the same: a £100 contribution cost
you £100 in pre-tax money.

------
wazoox
In France I only need to fill in charity donations opening tax reductions, and
digitally sign the web form. Takes about 3 minutes.

------
Fej
I'm one of the somewhat lucky ones - I file a Form 1040EZ. It's pretty simple.
Fill in the boxes, do a bit of really simple math, and sign on the dotted
line. My state, New Jersey, does free online filing as well.

There is a silver lining to everything. US tax filing isn't completely bad.

------
Oletros
In Spain is a breeze, a web app prefilled with your financial data

------
dfar1
lobbying lobbying lobbying.... tax companies drop millions of dollars to get
whatever they want. It's american politics at it's best.

------
warsharks
dont most places in the world have your employer deal with your tax
contributions?

------
juandazapata
Just one more proof that the U.S. Government is owned by corporations.

------
known
Unlike US, Japan is a homogeneous society
[http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2007/08/05/t...](http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2007/08/05/the_downside_of_diversity/)

~~~
ue_
Of what relevance is the ethnic or religious or hair colour or eye colour make
up of a nation to the ease of filing taxes?

~~~
rsynnott
I think there are some people who just automatically respond with that to any
criticism of US public services, even where it's nonsensical (if the point of
comparison is a country with a larger percentage of people born elsewhere than
the US, say).

------
huffmsa
"Hey, we here at The Government would like to make your experience paying
taxes less painful.

Hence forth, we're just going to take whatever amount we think is accurate,
and you don't have to do anything!

Just trust us!"

Politely sir, take one giant step back from that and your beachfront property
in Arizona, and diddle your own face.

Now, serious answer? Because EVERYTHING about the US Government is
intentionally designed to be slow, cumbersome and painful, SPECIFICALLY to
limit the amount of damage government institutions can cause to the country.

~~~
crisdux
I'm not sure why other people in this thread think this is crazy. This is
actually a widely held belief by Republicans. Many of them want paying taxes
to be hard so people will be conscious of government burden. They believe
making tax filing simple is a risk to our liberties.

~~~
jeltz
I have read about this before, but it still sounds totally crazy to me. There
have been plenty of inefficient and corrupt governments which still have
managed to impose police states. To me it seems like a cult of personality for
the leader is a greater threat to your liberty than efficient bureaucracy.

~~~
crisdux
I guess this boils down to philosophical differences in the role of
government. One side believes that greater taxation leads to a larger role of
government in society and results in the erosion of personal liberties. They
are afraid that making filing taxes easier could continue this trend. I don't
think this has anything to do with efficient bureaucracy and cult of
personalities. The discussion on if government is ever able to be an efficient
participant of all parts of society that it involves itself in is always up
for debate. One fundamental reason for this belief is that government can not
be the best solution to many of societies issues because the incentives on
individuals in government, government bureaucracies and the public are so
misaligned.

