They don't actually know. If they think something looks suspicious, they do an audit, and then they know.
The vast majority of people's taxes fillings are taken on good faith.
this post was submitted on 15 Apr 2024
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I enter in my w4 and take the standard deduction. Takes me 5 minutes.
Haven't owed since I had a retail job that reset my withholding when I got promoted to make it look like I got a bigger raise.
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What is special about today?
Last day to file taxes in the US without having filed for an extension.
"Listen bub, I'm just telling you what Intuit and H&R block pays me to tell you. So yeah, I both know and don't know what you owe. Let's call it Schrodinger's taxes and call it a day."
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This year I think the IRS is rolling our free preparation (federal, some states offer it to I think).
Go check it out.
But yeah this could all be automated. Just another cigarette in your eye for daring to exist in the conservative fascist multiverse.
I looked into this. I didn't qualify due to having an HSA.
Yeah this year it seems there's a lot of restrictions. I'm hoping next year it will be accessible to more people
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The answer of course is that the IRS doesn't know how much you owe, and it isn't feasible for them for figure out exact numbers for everyone with the tax code as complicated as it is. So, they audit a fraction of Americans every year to keep everyone honest. It's a bad system that taxes are so complicated but it's not a conspiracy.
It absolutely is a conspiracy though:
Except the federal government literally this year started instituting a free, public filling service to get around TurboTax. And they fought it tooth and nail.
There is a conspiracy, but it's not a federal government conspiracy. It's just a bad system that certain companies conspired to take advantage of.
I mean, the tax system is so bad because tax preparers like Intuit bribe politicians to keep it that way.
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because they won't tell you about the loop holes and exceptions you could be taking advantage of.
yep. They won't tell us if we payed them too much, they'll only tell us if we didn't pay them enough 😡
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works as well with just the last two panels
Wow, yeah -- way punchier
pan to tax preparation companies taking turns sucking off Uncle Sam
No panning required, just zoom out on the last frame and its quite explicit, with Unc's thought bubble being "I'M HAVING ONE!"
My son made a mistake on his state taxes and his return was rejected. The letter he got back basically said "we couldn't verify your reported property taxes, so you can resubmit a correction or do nothing and accept our version of your taxes" (where he gets back about $200 less because of a typo.)
So, like, yeah. They're just comparing your notes to theirs, with the default benefiting the state.
Seems like the property taxes would be the easiest thing in the world for them to verify. Unless they've been lying to themselves.
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God, I would hate to have to work out my taxes every year laughs in British
I know what you mean. Laughs in Dutch
Hey, some of us do have to do taxes, but you pretty much follow a questionnaire on the gov.uk website then fill out some numbers from paperwork you'll already have (P60, payslips, etc). I had to whip out the calculator once to add up 12 numbers for my student loan.
Could probably do it in under an hour if you're not doing anything unusual.
The American system sounds very much not that.
For many Americans it’s actually pretty simple as long as they’re working with a standard W-2 (form you get from your employer with the year’s wages and taxes and stuff filled out). Many tax prep services will even import these numbers automatically and all you have to do is click through the questions and optional things like if you want to donate your returns to anything or pay estimated taxes for the next year - mostly stuff that most people aren’t concerned with anyway.
Taxes here start getting complicated when you are an independent contractor (you’re responsible for holding out taxes from your income since you don’t have an employer to do it for you) and/or have non-standard sources of income like stocks, shares, real estate holdings, etc. which the IRS may or may not have information on, thus why you need to provide the info.
Most of what has made calculating taxes and paying/getting returns a pain in the ass is tax prep companies like TurboTax lobbying to make and keep the tax filing process a confusing one, with the goal of steering you into paying for the non-free filing options.
Oh interesting yeah, so doesn't actually sound too complex for most people then.
I'm a little confused about the last part, what are the main differences between paid and free services if it's as simple as you describe with the W-2 form?
The legal requirement for tax prep services like turbo tax to offer free filling is, in true capitalist style, a qualified one. All they’re really required to offer for free is the basic tax return form - Form 1040. Even with a typical W-2 job, you may have additional non-standard forms to fill out, particularly relating to healthcare coverage since here in America, of course that’s tied to your employment.
When you start getting those non-standard forms, tax prep services can start charging you to upgrade to the premium tier that handles those forms for you - your alternative being to file online what you can for free and doing the rest by hand, but being non-standard forms they of course read like stereo instructions so good luck with that.
At first it doesn’t seem that bad - you sigh and say, “Fine, it’s only $32.” But then you get to the last page and find out it’s $32 for each return filed - most Americans file at least 2, federal and state. So now it’s $64. And say you’re in my situation where you live in a city that straddles a state line - many here work in one state but live in another, so that a federal and two state returns. Now we’re up to $96. You want your returns direct deposited to your bank instead of a paper check? Another fee, because fuck trees. So by the time it’s over you’re paying over $100 in essentially convenience fees for the very companies that make tax prep miserable to do it all for you. To make you feel better about it the services will say you’re also getting stuff like audit protection and various other fluff, nothing that really costs them anything to provide.
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Um, The American system is exactly like that.
Apparently so! I'm just finding this out
I had got the impression that it was some laborious task where you basically had to hire an accountant or pay for some software
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Its a nice break from figuring out if the amount my medical providers charged me lines up with the estimation of benefits provided by my medical insurance company and trying to get a denied claim paid.