Because many conservatives are not sheep! 
To be fair, I understand that many agencies need mounted, or armed, security for their offices and data centers. I presume that most of the numbers listed are for that purpose.
For field work, I can see Revenuers and DoA agents needing vests, but not guns. Remember that guns don’t kill people. People kill people … along with non-electric SUVs. :]
Will this be manned by some of the 77,000 new agents they’re hiring?
The Internal Revenue Service has quietly built its own prototype system to allow Americans to file tax returns digitally and free of charge, according to three current and former agency officials, essentially creating government software that could disrupt the tax-prep industry.
The tax agency tapped the left-leaning New America think tank to study the matter and produce a report, which is expected this week.
50/50 odds it never sees the light of day.
I didn’t read to see if there were any details, but I’m assuming it’s basically grafting some sort of interview function onto the free fillable forms service they already offer? The only shortcoming of that program is the lack of handholding to help users put numbers in the correct places.
I also assume there will be a not-insignificant segment of tax filers who will insist that you need to use other options because somehow you cant trust the IRS to be fair in their calculations.
Intuit is spending millions lobbying to make sure it does not happen.
Regarding interviews, some have speculated/dreamed that the IRS could pre-fill a lot of information since they have the 1099s. Well, we can dream can’t we?
A politician’s dream - kickbacks to award the contracts, then more kickbacks to kill the project.
And that would spark a round of all-new conspiracy theories…
I would welcome it so long as there is a way to dispute the data.
Oh well, I think your 50-50 estimate is way too optimistic.
Thanks for the heads up. I kept hoping they would can id.me entirely, or at least keep the existing irs.gov login option or add login.gov. So stupid.
Free File Fillable Forms is not an IRS thing, it’s run by the Free File Alliance. From the privacy statement, it seems like the company that does it on behalf of the FFA is On-LineTaxes, Inc.: Free File Fillable Forms
If the IRS indeed comes out with their own software, I’d stay away from it. The federal government underpays software developers and you see the results - that passport website was a complete disaster. Healthcare.gov was another debacle. As long as FreeTaxUSA is free… I’m sticking with them.
Let’s give it a chance. Because it’s not in their interest for such software to make mistakes – they’ll end up having to pay more if it doesn’t calculate things correctly, be it via less-than-owed collections or via higher eventual refunds due to having to pay interest.
I’m sorry, but this is overly optimistic. We end up paying more. Through increased taxes, dealing with erroneous IRS notices sent to our homes, the stress of frivolous audits, etc. They have absolutely zero incentive not to make mistakes. It’s not their money on the line and their jobs are protected by their unions and seniority. When the taxpayer makes a mistake on a return, they’re subject to interest and a penalty, and sometimes an closer inspection of their financial lives.
When the IRS makes a mistake, it’s a shrug and maybe a correction of it, if you can find the right person to make that happen. The IRS doesn’t stress out about their mistakes.
The way that the state department treated “volunteers” (their term) of the online passport renewal program was pitiful. When the program went haywire and the website wasn’t functioning, it was on us to contact our Senators and Representatives to get our passports. State gave timelines that were blown past, with no accountability for their mistakes. Applicants on Reddit reported losing thousands in travel costs because it took State 14+ weeks to process a passport due to IT failures when they promised no more than 9. Meanwhile paper applications were processed within stated timeframes. No one at State bothered to prioritize our cases - it was only when the Congresscritters got involved that things started to happen.
With respect to engineering disciplines, the government’s payscale is way out of date. If you’re a civil engineer, you get paid quite well - often better than those in private practice. But as a software engineer, you’re paid half (often less) of what you can get paid in the private sector. As a result, they get less than stellar talent working on these tech projects and the results speak for themselves.
So no, I won’t give it a chance until the system has proven itself. If you want to be a “volunteer”, that’s great. Go for it. I won’t be anywhere near it.
if they really wanted to compete with TT/HR they should integrate their wage and other income info they receive into the return automatically. Then we put in our deductions/credits
In the interim i manually crosscheck that transcript but lots of XX’d out info makes it hard.
You should have kept your new post separate. It is not obvious that you updated your previous post with the latest information.
Looks like they indeed removed the ability to login with an IRS.gov account. That’s too bad. I feel like it should be illegal for them to outsource the logins. TreasuryDirect has a login, and they’re in the same friggin department! How hard could it be?!
This hard. Maybe they’ll use some of that $80 gabillion to get off of 50+ year old CDC drives and electronics that may still use wire length for timing. 
As a California disaster victim /sarcasm, I am delaying my payment to the IRS until the October deadline. I’m sure the great IRS computer system will be able to handle that. Actually, I just had an example of their incompetence. I received a CP 14 saying my payment was due by June 26. Apparently they sent out thousands of these. They finally apologized.
The IRS reassures California taxpayers that they continue to have an automatic extension until later this year to file and pay their taxes for those covered by disaster declarations in the state. The current mailings being received by some taxpayers, the IRS Notice CP14, are for taxpayers who have a balance due, and they are sent out as a legal requirement. While the notice received by taxpayers says they need to pay in 21 days, most California taxpayers have until later this year to pay under the disaster declaration. These letters include a special insert that notes the payment date listed in the letter does not apply to those covered by a disaster declaration, and the disaster dates remain in effect.
The IRS apologizes to taxpayers and tax professionals for any confusion as we continue to review the situation. Taxpayers receiving these letters do not need to call the IRS or their tax professional.
Of course you can trust the IRS’s assurances, reassurances, and re-reassurances … until you can’t.
I look forward to the precedent setting actions of the First Son on how sex clubs and services are apparently now deductible.
Dumbass playboy prolly got caught for taking a 100% deduction. T&A is T&E, capped at 50%!
Following its 2021 electoral victory, the Nordic nation’s Labor Party made good on its promise to soak the rich. Norway is one of just a handful of OECD countries that still taxes net wealth, and the Labor Party increased the country’s wealth tax to 1.1 percent despite warnings that such a move would “trigger capital flight and threaten job creation.”
Capital flight is exactly what happened, and it has left the Norwegian government with less revenue.
Are Americans paying attention? Not in California.
Vote with your feet, a few nice charts
Tax revenue
Population changes
For the first time, six fast-growing states in the South — Florida, Texas, Georgia, the Carolinas and Tennessee — are contributing more to the national GDP than the Northeast, with its Washington-New York-Boston corridor… The switch happened during the pandemic and shows no signs of reverting.
