IRS vows to digitize all taxpayer documents by 2025
All documents will be digitized as soon as they arrive at the IRS.
![IRS vows to digitize all taxpayer documents by 2025 [Updated]](https://lemdro.id/pictrs/image/3deca6b5-c9c5-42bf-9b04-daf8643f9aaf.jpeg?format=webp)
Maybe once they tackle this they can figure out a way to just send me a fucking bill every year instead of forcing me to do their work to then send them money.
They’ve actually been trying to do this for years. There were actually a couple years of tests out in California I think. However, there are two big lobbies that always put a halt to it, tax preparation services (H&R Block, Intuit, etc.) and groups that want taxes to be a pain in the ass so we’ll all bitch about them.
Check out this episode of Planet Money if you want to learn more:
They already know how, it's been blocked as far as i'm aware by Tax return companies.
I think they already do in a sense; that's the standard deduction. If you want to maximize your returns you might be better off itemizing though, and that option is what makes everything complicated (I suspect they'd have a hard time sending you a bill for everything you itemize... I don't know that they really know everything you could itemize; I think that really only comes up when it's suspicious/you get audited).
i.e., if they did that, you'd basically get fewer options, and maybe less money back(?)
87% of people take the standard deduction. Just give people a bill (or I dunno, take out the correct amount to begin with) and allow people to contest or do an itemized deduction if they disagree.
Several countries have already figured this out, ot isn't rocket surgery. The government has a pretty good idea what you owe, and send you a bill. If you want to take another route, you're free to submit your own taxes, but the vast majority don't need to do anything like that. There's no reason we couldn't use the same system, if it assumes standard deduction that would cover the vast majority of people. Anyone who wants to itemize would be free to, it just wouldn't be automatic, so essentially, nothing would change for them. Well, almost nothing, the difference is if they take too long they have a safety net standard deduction already filed and done I guess.
Even when you take the standard deduction, only had one job in one state for the tax year, and have no investments or other income (ie. the only way your taxes could be simpler is if you don't have any income and someone else pays all your bills), it's still complicated to file taxes manually. Many other developed countries will automatically calculate the most common scenarios for most taxpayers, and only people with unusual situations have to do any manual calculations (or pay a tax preparer).
He explains it a little better
I don't think sending you a bill would work for most people, since they don't know how much you owe until you tell them whether you're married, have dependent kids, have a mortgage, etc. These are things they need to verify every year, so you will always need to send them something every year.
That said, they could certainly make the process simpler.
The government already knows all that information about you. You give your family information to your employer which passes it on to the government. Your mortgage company (and any other financial institution for that matter) sends the government information about your loans/accounts. That's how they know you filled out your taxes correctly to begin with.
Insane they're still on paper now. Seems like a great way to loose things and create tones of extra work.
Welcome to (let's be honest, Republican) policies that cut "in-house" staffing for decades at various federal institutions, instead outsourcing important work to contractors, under funding of important projects, and general "backwards" operation.
And they do. My family member still insists on only submitting thier taxes by snail mail. For 2021, the IRS lost the original, required a second submission (of original documents, lol), and then lost that one. In the end, they had to get an advocate to help them submit a third, and final return.
At least they didn't owe, or I'm sure they would have been in big trouble. But of course the IRS sending the refund check over a year late, has no repercussions...
H&R Block and all tax prep companies should not exist.
Just in time for the next Carrington Event!
Is there a way to make digitalization more difficult? Does that green ink thing still work? What about using a No. 3 pencil?
