Millions of Americans mess up their taxes, but a new law will help
23 comments
·December 7, 2025JSR_FDED
CodingJeebus
This is by design. Income tax filing is a long-solved problem in much of the first world.
One of the easiest ways to convince the public that the government is inept and wasteful is to make it as difficult to do the necessary as possible. If politicians cared, this wouldn’t be an issue.
anon291
Basically nothing is going to happen to you if you make a best effort. So many people focus on getting it correct and pay hundreds or thousands to do so. I've filed my taxes incorrectly by accident for years and the IRS just sends me a correction and the new amount
crooked-v
Politicians do care. Unfortunately, the ones who care are the ones who want taxes to be painful and complicated, to benefit the TurboTax lobby and/or to keep people constantly viscerally aware that they're paying taxes at all.
loeg
It's to H&R Block's benefit to make you feel that taxes are stressful and you need 3rd party help, though. That you were stressed out about this interaction is H&R's fault; not the law or the IRS.
nickthegreek
There is shared blame here.
zeroonetwothree
H&R Block isn’t exactly the top tier accounting option. Not sure what you were expecting. It’s like going to McDonald’s and being disappointed at the food quality.
enraged_camel
This is the result of decades of Republican lobbying, legislation and outright sabotage. The philosophy, openly advertised by Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform, goes like this: nobody likes taxes. So if people find the filing process difficult and stressful every year, they will be constantly reminded of this fact. This will in turn make them more open to suggestions and propaganda along the lines of taxes being something that must be fought tooth and nail at every turn, because let's face it, who wants the tax code to become even more complex?
In contrast, if the process is streamlined every year, most people won't even pay attention to how much they pay in taxes - which isn't great if your ultimate goal is to keep government as small as possible.
smitty1e
Dare one ask where all of the AI proponents are when the subjects of public budgeting and taxation arise?
entropoem
Tax should be something that must be standard, simple, educated from a young age. But somehow miraculously it still becomes full of pressure in any country.
whycombinetor
Pedantry: the article claims "Paying taxes is a universal experience", but only 60.4% (2024) of American households pay income tax.
LorenPechtel
Sounds like a very good idea. I never got a math error notice but I've gotten a few that were fundamentally a case of transposed digits--and it was not one bit clear. You didn't report interest from ABC--but looking at my return it clearly shows interest from ABC. It would have been much easier if they said their files show more interest from ABC than you are reporting.
toomuchtodo
H.R.998 - Internal Revenue Service Math and Taxpayer Help Act - https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/998
a_bonobo
> to accurately prepopulate tax returns for around 45% of Americans. (Those other countries have much simpler tax codes than we do.)
One should note that the cited study quotes the 45% from a 1992 study. These days, with gig economy and quasi-self-employment, that number is probably higher since you don't have an employer who reports your income for you.
Still, here in Australia, where we have the return-free tax system, adding what you earned from your various gig jobs isn't too hard: you add that as items to the web form: 'I made 15,123 from Uber Eats'. That just gets added to your overall return. I don't see how that's so hard compared to the US?
lbotos
In the states if you are a contractor there are tons of things that you can deduct from your taxable income. So “figuring out how much you should be taxed” is after those deductions.
If uber paid you $15123 but you:
Just bought a new bike bc your other was stolen
You paid $1200 for insurance
You bought a helmet and cold weather clothes etc etc.
Those things reduce your taxable income.
a_bonobo
Yes, same in Australia. Keep receipts and add the cost to the web form.
They have simplified it nicely, though: if you work from home you can claim a per-hour deduction so you don't have to do the math of wear-and-tear, electricity, internet etc. I think it was $0.6 per hour?
chemotaxis
I think that's common in most places. What's different in the US is that the IRS forces you to proactively provide a lot more information about it, though. I have a rental property and need to enter the same information about the same income and expenses on three different forms, breaking it down in different ways. It's tedious and error-prone, and I guess the philosophy is that it's easier to spot fraud if the numbers on all the different forms don't add up to a coherent story.
Other countries presumably rely on other fraud signals. They might have more visibility into your day-to-day financial transactions, or there might be more of a culture of leaving an anonymous tip if you suspect your neighbor isn't paying a fair share.
oklahomasports
What three forms are you talking about?
Titan2189
> Those other countries have much simpler tax codes than we do
All German readers spew out their drink in disbelief - Pardon what?
gentooflux
The German word for how complicated the tax code is is "die Steuerverfassungskomplexität"
zeroonetwothree
Was Germany one of the listed countries?
mbreese
Yes.
> United Kingdom, Japan, South Korea, New Zealand, Germany, Italy, Spain, Denmark, Sweden, and the Netherlands, among other countries.
temptemptemp111
[dead]
Taxes in the US are unnecessarily stressful. I remember going to H&R Block and being sent home to find some piece of supporting documentation because it was “really important”. I turned the whole apartment upside down but wasn’t able to find it. Went back to the tax preparer in a state of high anxiety. When I asked what would happen if I couldn’t find the document and was told the impact on the final assessment could be as high as $80. Would have gladly spent 10x that to avoid the stress.