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In Support Of A Democrat's Tax Plan
R. Alex Whitlock
For the first time in my taxpaying history, Camille and I had to file for an extension. Unfortunately neither of her W-2 forms came in. Being completely inexperienced with tax extensions I didn't realize that you were supposed to have an idea of how much money you paid in taxes and how much you owe. Well heck, if I knew that I might not have to file for an extension!
Anyhow, that brings me John Edwards's
proposal to have the IRS pay my taxes for me:
Under his plan, the IRS would gather tax information for 50 million Americans with relatively simple returns, including those who don't need to file itemized deductions to record charitable contributions or capital gains.
The IRS would calculate their tax bill or refund and mail a final report to the taxpayer. That person would be able to just sign and return the form. Edwards' campaign estimates that process would save taxpayers an estimated 225 million hours each year.
The IRS already collects basic tax information for audit purposes, but Edwards questioned why the service makes taxpayers spend days "gathering their information, hunched over tax forms and tax tables and calculator trying to figure it all out, just to tell the IRS the information it already has and it already knows."
I've always wondered about that myself. It seems to me that a whole lot of information is duplicated between employer and employee. Apparently a program like that was tried in California and was a smashing success.
Observations
Some of the info the IRS may have. If you're intending charitable deductions, if you donated volunteer time, if you're deducting business expenses or anything like that, the IRS doesn't know these things.
I'm not sure which is better, but I (perhaps in the minority) see my doing my taxes as a chance to check the IRS's work and make sure they are doing it right, and inform them of things they missed.
This program is obviously targetted at people that don't itemize. That's a very significant portion of the American public. Those that do itemize would continue to do what they do now. And I'm pretty sure the option would be left open to do it the standard way, if you so desire.
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