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Comment by rayvd | Hacker News Reader

I can't imagine how horrible a single captive solution from the IRS would be compared to one spawned by the competitive marketplace.

Now why our tax code needs to be so complex that it requires software like Turbo Tax is certainly a fair question.

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I would imagine it would look like European solutions; which pretty much work perfectly vs whatever bullshit a market would put out.

> I can't imagine how horrible a single captive solution from the IRS would be compared to one spawned by the competitive marketplace.

I see literally no reason to think the IRS would do a worse job of it than the commercial services.

But regardless of that, there's no reason why the IRS couldn't provide services alongside the commercial services. It's not an either-or.

Of all the government agencies, I think the IRS actually has one of the best track records for caring deeply about UX. Compare the federal tax forms and instructions to just about any state tax forms, the federal forms are miles ahead in terms of usability. Relative to the complexity of the tax code itself, of course (which the IRS doesn't control).

And it'd probably cost a billion dollars. Government contracting is way more corrupted than the shenanigans alleged by this article.

Remember the healthcare.gov debacle? TurboTax isn't that much and it saves time and headache. People think in binary of free vs not-free while not considering the cost of time.

It "saves" time that is taken away from you by intentionally complicated tax code and filing procedures, that are pushed by lobbyists hired by the same company that sells you TurboTax.

So we're blaming TurboTax for a corrupt government. If the government is supposed to represent the people, it's doing a shit job, and I can't blame TurboTax for cashing in. About the only thing we can do boycott TurboTax.

When corruption involves two parties, we generally blame both of them, yes. Giving a bribe is illegal, not just receiving it.

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