Should the IRS get into the business of preparing people's tax returns? Just asking that question is stoking controversy. Here's why.

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Advocates say it's time for Americans to be able to prep and file their taxes directly with the IRS. Opponents say it's government overreach.

Weeks earlier, organizations sent letters to lawmakers skewering the IRS and warning of overreach by an agency that’s flush with cash.Last... Just before Tax Day, activists protested in front of an H&R Block office.

He was part of an April 17 demonstration outside of an H&R Block branch in Washington, D.C. “It was really to draw attention to the way the private tax prep companies have a stranglehold on the tax filing process in the United States,” he said. Any IRS-run tax prep system that could spring from the study “is going to get hijacked in a way that it’s going to direct people towards the welfare state, towards preferred liberal outcomes,” Ellis said.

“ Any IRS-run tax prep system “is going to get hijacked in a way that it’s going to direct people towards the welfare state, towards preferred liberal outcomes.”” In its spending plan for the $80 billion, the IRS says it will “explore making it easier for many taxpayers to file returns for free with a question-based electronic service to prepare and file tax returns directly with the IRS.”Emphasis on could, not will.

That hasn’t happened in America, even though more than 30 countries have some type of return-free system, according to PwC. America’s tax rules and credits are also more complicated than many countries with those systems, the firm added. Last year, the program handled over 3.2 million returns, he noted. It’s a sucessful program but Congress and the IRS “just need to advertise Free File,” Hugo said.

 

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