FTC bans TurboTax from advertising 'free' services, calls deceptive advertising

https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/22/business/ftc-turbotax-free-services/index.html

by fairytalemtg • 3 years ago

879 244 3 years ago

abirch• 3 years ago

This is nice. Free should mean free no matter how much large print text to clarify is needed.

xahrepap• 3 years ago

Next I’d like them to go after windshield chip repair shops and pharmacies that advertise “free*” services. Where free == paid by your insurance. Assuming your insurance will pay for all of it.

Free doesn’t mean paid for someone you paid to handle it for you.

al_borland4• 3 years ago

I asked one of those chip repair guys how it worked years ago. He said the insurance companies pay them to repair the chips, because those little fixes are much cheaper than paying to replace the whole windshield when it inevitably cracks. It seems like a win-win-win. The driver gets the windshield fixed with no out of pocket cost, the chip guy makes some cash, and the insurance company saves money.

Where’s the downside?

coloneltcb• 3 years ago

Intuit is an embarrassment of a tech company. Instead of innovating in software, they've invested infinitely more in lobbying to keep tax-filing complex and in creating new and innovative dark patterns to obscure their (federally mandated, btw) free product.

toomuchtodo• 3 years ago

They are not a tech company. They are a regulatory capture company that uses tech to extract from the general public what should be free. The code and platform are the performance art to enable the rake.

Edit: Meant to scope this comment solely to TurboTax. Replies correcting me are well deserved.

pcurve2• 3 years ago

I think most people would be shocked to learn how big intuit is in terms of market cap. Bigger than Verizon wellsfargo ibm nike

WesternWind• 3 years ago

No, they are a tech company, they produce software for their main product.

Like a lot of companies, tech and not, they use their power and resources to keep their position.

The difference is that their actual competitor is the government. But that's also a big part of why private healthcare is way too expensive in the US, for worse results than other places.

MathMonkeyMan2• 3 years ago

Free government-provided tax calculators and online filing are an existential threat to Intuit. I think that the business should not exist (or should be scaled down to a fraction of its size, as an accountant's tool), but can you blame them for trying to block the deathblow?

quantified• 3 years ago

Sure. How much don't you blame the rat whose claws are embedded in your hand as you try to throw it in the river?

slg2• 3 years ago

they've invested infinitely more in lobbying to keep tax-filing complex

I always feel the need to point out that anger at this is misplaced. Intuit is a business lobbying on behalf of itself like countless other businesses do. If the result makes you upset, you should be upset at our political system and the politicians who are willing to sell out the country for whatever those lobbyists are pushing. It is those politicians who are supposed to prioritize the good of the country, not Intuit or their lobbyists.

jjulius6• 3 years ago

We can be upset at politicians for "selling out" to the lobbyists.

We can be upset at lobbyists for pushing things that they know aren't in the best interests of consumers.

We can be upset at businesses for wanting to take advantage of consumers for their own gain.

All of these can be true at the same time.

nshelly2• 3 years ago

Intuit also produces Quickbooks -- which actually is SMB accounting software, and used internationally.

As most of their revenue is from businesses who wouldn't easily be able to free-file, I wouldn't be surprised if Intuit's lobbying to prevent a free tax filing offering from the government was causing them more harm than good.

jimbob45• 3 years ago

And now QuickBooks is also a bank? Offering checking accounts? I suspect they’ve just partnered with a real bank to do so but the brand confusion is off the charts.

bsimpson• 3 years ago

This decision is the result of a biased and broken system where the Commission serves as accuser, judge, jury, and then appellate judge all in the same case

Interesting argument, but also a distraction from "we lied in advertising."

It could also clearly disclose the percentage of customers that actually do qualify for the free service, somewhere close to the “free” claim advertised, the commission said.

They ran an ad during the 49ers game this weekend, centered around it being free for the character in the ad. I'm guessing that's how they'll work around this.

MBCook2• 3 years ago

Bills game too. I noticed it because I thought they were already banned.

It was much more clear it wasn’t free for everyone than the old “free free free free” ads, but still heavily emphasized the free part.

mardef• 3 years ago

Their phrasing is specific to align themselves with the current supreme Court review of deference.

They'll likely delay until that decision has come down and they hope they can just claim the laws were unconstitutional in the first place.

https://www.scotusblog.com/2024/01/supreme-court-to-hear-maj...

granzymes• 3 years ago

Right idea, wrong case. The relevant case this term is SEC v. Jarkesy, which presents some of the "Federal agency adjudication is unconstitutional" arguments. The FTC brought this suit in-house before their own Administrative Law Judge, which is what TurboTax is protesting. The two cases related to Chevron deference also implicate agency power, but they implicate agency power in the actual courts.

https://www.scotusblog.com/2023/11/justices-to-consider-mult...

fyrn_• 2 years ago

Honestly, not thsg interesting of an argument to me as a citizen. This is exactly the kind if thing I want the FTC to have the power to handle without getting tied up in court for 15 years like everything else seems to.

Far to easy for a corp to delay while it pays otherwise.

WheelsAtLarge• 3 years ago

Finally, something is being done. Paying taxes should be free for most people. Especially if you only have to deal with the standard deductions.

chad_strategic3• 3 years ago

I came here to say the above. But let me add the following… Intuit is a criminal lobbying organization.

mulmen9• 3 years ago

What laws have they broken?

financypants• 3 years ago

I guess they’re not doing a great job then? Because of the auto-filing/IRS-backed filing system being developed?

ijhuygft7763• 3 years ago

Our documents should not be sent automatically to the IRS if the IRS won't figure out our taxes.

mulmen9• 3 years ago

Can they figure out our taxes without our returns? For simple stuff like paychecks maybe. What if you are self-employed? What if you are a contractor? What if you barter or pay cash?

hunter2_• 3 years ago

They will figure out your taxes (according to whatever information they have at the time) and retaliate if you file something that doesn't jibe.

They just won't do it before you do. That way, they might learn things they didn't yet know, from people who decide (as legally obligated) to divulge additional information. I assume that they assume that far fewer people would divulge additional information, if their "you talk first, I talk second" tactic went away.

topkai22• 2 years ago

Speaking generally, but the IRS as an institution would love to be able to move to automated tax filing.

The thing that is blocking that happening is intense lobbying by intuit (and a few others) plus anti-tax groups. See https://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-maker-of-turbotax... for what was probably that best quick summary from about 10 years ago.

ghaff9• 3 years ago

If you're standard deduction and just have a few simple sources of income, filing is easily free. Should it be electronic and pre-filled? Yes. But this idea that you need an accountant or tax prep software if you have a W-2 and a 1099 just isn't true. The forms are free.

ok_dad2• 3 years ago

Awesome, let's do better and have the IRS fill out your form in Feb or March, mail it to you, and if you disagree you can still file yourself. That way, 95% of cases are covered and don't have to even deal with taxes.

cj2• 3 years ago

Half of the allure of turbo tax is figuring out if the standard deduction is more or less favorable than itemized.

Maybe the IRS should start by building a tool that points you in the right direction before it tries to build a TurboTax clone.

al_borland4• 3 years ago

My issue is they advertise “free, free, free”, but only for federal. After you go through everything they hit you up for money to file with the state. To go elsewhere means doing everything again, so people just pay it.

It’s probably technically in the fine print, but it certainly felt like bait and switch the first time I ran into it over 20 years ago. I’m still bitter all these years later, and get reminded on a yearly basis, as it’s still standard practice. They can make federal “free”, because they can just lump all the costs in on the state taxes. Nothing is actually free.

It also makes no sense to me that it costs money to e-file, while sending in paperwork that a person needs to open and process is free. It seems so backward.

Dalewyn2• 2 years ago

But this idea that you need an accountant or tax prep software if you have a W-2 and a 1099 just isn't true.

I hire a CPA to do my dead simple returns that I can do myself.

Why?

Because I don't trust myself to have done it correctly. No, I can't sincerely swear everything written is true and correct to the best of my knowledge because I do not trust myself.

That's why I hire a CPA, because I need someone I can point to for legal liability purposes. Am I throwing away money, so to speak? Perhaps, and I don't care; I'm buying peace of mind.

kevin_thibedeau• 3 years ago

They've always been no more then the cost of a stamp.

munk-a• 3 years ago

That's extremely disingenuous and ignores the amount of labor required to self-file in the US. Most of the information you send to the IRS they already know - they just can't tell you because Intuit wants to justify their existence.

dehrmann• 3 years ago

A 1040EZ covers that case and filing it is the cost of the stamp and envelope.

Guvante2• 3 years ago

The federal government can do a 1040EZ for you.

Intuit has blocked government attempts to do that by offering free taxes for half of Americans (that was the deal).

Of course they decided to renegade and only do 37% per their advertising.

Hilarious since they had the "federal is free but you need to pay for state" scam going already.

plus• 3 years ago

My understanding is that if a 1040EZ is appropriate for you, then TurboTax will also be free. It's only if you have a more complex filing situation that they charge. Please correct me if I'm wrong, though.

calvinmorrison2• 3 years ago

And an understanding of tax law

ghaff9• 3 years ago

There is no 1040EZ as I understand it though there is the base-level 1040.

technothrasher• 3 years ago

1040EZ hasn't been a thing since 2017. But if you have a simple tax situation, the regular 1040 isn't all that hard to fill out.

mock-possum• 3 years ago

Paying taxes should be free for everyone imo.

andirk2• 2 years ago

Isn't a 1040-EZ free and takes 10 minutes? My tax situation is kind of complicated and costs me like $150 for all of the things TurboTax finds, figures out, calculates, submits, and all in a nice UI. Can someone please explain to me what is so horrible about paying a reasonable fee to figure out some complicated stuff that amounts to 80+ pages of filing docs? And free if it's EZ? And free if low income?

Caligatio• 2 years ago

The tax code is deliberately complicated because, in part, of the lobbying by Intuit and H&R Block. They're creating an artificial market for their $150 services and convinced the populace this is reasonable.

mportela• 3 years ago

Any recommendations on how to really file taxes for free (federal and state)?

linsomniac2• 3 years ago

I've been using https://www.freetaxusa.com/ the last couple years and plan to continue this year. It is free for Federal (though I usually pay for an upgrade), and state is $15. The only option I know of for free state is to do the forms manually.

ok_dad2• 3 years ago

I second this suggestion. The free federal taxes and $15 state actually mean free federal and $15 for state! You can certainly add on the "pro service" or "audit protection" or whatever if you want, but it is simple to say NO to those and just do the forms. This year, I opted for the "audit protection" because of some new tax forms I had to fill out, but overall I only paid $45 with the sales tax.

I used to use Turbo Tax and paid about $100 per year on average, but it was simple to switch to using another provider, I just had to get the previous year's return out to fill some stuff that is filled automatically if you use the service each year.

takk309• 3 years ago

I decided to use FreetaxUSA on the advice of another HN thread and I was very happy with the results. I had used TurboTax for the last 8 years and can say that FreetaxUSA was much easier to navigate. I was asked to upgrade to their top tier 2 times and it was very clear how to continue with the free federal option.

timw4mail• 3 years ago

Cash App Taxes. Free federal and state.

tunesmith2• 3 years ago

Hrm. How do they make money?

z3ugma• 3 years ago

The most scam-sounding federal government website ever, Free File Fillable Forms https://www.irs.gov/e-file-providers/free-file-fillable-form...

AdieuToLogic2• 3 years ago

Another program the IRS is rolling out is called "Direct File"[0]:

  In 2024, we're launching a new pilot tax filing service
  called Direct File. If you're eligible and choose to
  participate, file your 2023 federal tax return online,
  for free, directly with IRS.

It appears to be limited to a handful of states thus far.

0 - https://www.irs.gov/about-irs/strategic-plan/direct-file

JadeNB4• 3 years ago

At least it's under the irs.gov domain now. As recently as last year, I had to, or at least thought I had to, go to the even scammier-sounding https://www.freefilefillableforms.com.

loeg• 3 years ago

FWIW, TurboTax has a C# method ("IsProductActivationRequired()" or something like that) you can overwrite to 'return false' with tools like dnSpy.

junon• 3 years ago

There's a desktop version? Does it offer the same as the site?

dmoy3• 3 years ago

If your income is low enough, all of the main tools

If not, then federal free through FreeTaxUSA. Depending on your state, the state taxes manually via PDF + paper may be extremely quick - like five or so lines, and a single table lookup.

tunesmith2• 3 years ago

Semi-dumb follow-up question. If we don't use a website service, then other than using forms, is the only option to actually find the pdfs, print out the forms, fill them in with a pen, and stuff them in an envelope? Or are there easier ways?

ProllyInfamous• 2 years ago

I use a type-writer, but otherwise: yes. Does it get any easier?

handity• 2 years ago

If your income is below $79,000 a year, this is the correct link: https://apps.irs.gov/app/freeFile/browse-all-offers/

It has been remarkably absent in this thread.

logiduck• 3 years ago

I just saw an TurboTax Ad where a guy was like "I Like free stuff" and then it said he was "happy to read the disclaimer" on TurboTax and see that "Roughly 37% of taxpayers qualify" which he looks thoughtfully in the distance and says "Thats me!"

I thought it was a funny commercial because 37% doesn't seem like a lot and Turbotax is portraying it as the average person will identify themselves as part of that 37% even though that is not too far off form just 1/3 people so a minority of people.

It was one of the few times I saw a company blatantly lean into the negatives in their fine print and just outright tell you its good.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iijnr4UR4QE

halJordan• 3 years ago

I agree on every level, but I'm compelled to remind you this is the America where wendy's (?) had to revert to a 1/4 pounder from a 1/3 pounder bc people thought they were getting less meat. And let's not forget the ever-present anti-education cohort that can't be convinced math is good even when you tell them it's how you calculate discounts or tips.

sharps1• 3 years ago

I had to look this up as I didn’t grow up in the States. It was A&W.

https://www.snopes.com/news/2022/06/17/third-pound-burger-fr...

Crazy.

foob• 3 years ago

It's also important to take any corporation's explanation for increasing their own margins with an extremely large grain of salt. I'm not doubting in the slightest that consumers had some confusion around the fractions, but all it would take for the company to revert their campaign is for the increase in sales to insufficiently offset the increase in their own costs. Blaming it on consumer stupidity afterwards washes their hands of any responsibility for backpedaling, and makes for a memorable and repeatable story that increases brand recognition while simultaneously painting them as heroically trying to offer more value for the same cost.

m463• 2 years ago

  VINCENT: And in Paris, you can buy a beer at McDonald's. And you know what they call a Quarter Pounder with Cheese in Paris?

  JULES: They don't call it a Quarter Pounder with Cheese?

  VINCENT: No, they got the metric system there, they wouldn't know what the f*** a Quarter Pounder is.

  JULES: Then what do they call it?

  VINCENT: They call it Royale with Cheese.

  JULES: Royale with Cheese. What do they call a Big Mac?

  VINCENT: Big Mac's a Big Mac, but they call it Le Big Mac.

Aside: a lot of tax preparation services, or their services that let you upload your data - the privacy policy says they can all "use" your financial info.

filoleg• 2 years ago

You say “this is America”, but my mother (who grew up in USSR/Russia and was in her mid 30s at the time) was seriously asking middle-schooled me on multiple occasions whether 0.7 liters of milk was less than 0.55 liters. I don’t remember the exact numbers, i just remember that the smaller volume one had 2 digits past the decimal, and the larger one just had 1 digit.

And no, she wasn’t testing my knowledge, she was seriously confused, as she would ask me that even later in life. Mind you, she has a masters degree. She is in her early 50s right now, and she is fully of sound mind to this day, not senile or anything like that.

Imo, this type of silliness is rather common across many different places, but Americans just tend to own it and not be afraid of coming off silly (if that’s how they genuinely end up behaving in a given situation).

purple_ferret• 3 years ago

Are they leaning in to it or are they forced to fit in the disclaimer?

Seems like the strategy of the ad is to repeat the word "Free" so much people don't remember the rest and to make it seem like the disclaimer is meaningless. Even with it, it's still free.

chefandy• 3 years ago

Probably a bit of both. What the commenter is describing is a textbook social proof tactic. "Hey, I like free stuff and taxes make me feel like a bit of a doofus, just like that guy. And like that guy, I see myself as the clever sort of person that isn't fooled by fine print. That free Turbo Tax program sounds awfully useful and free for people like me!" And Intuit can also point to that commercial and say "how is this trying to disguise the proof?" and they'd be right. They're just also trying to make it feel free still by making it free for a relatable character.

Sounds hokey but that sort of shit has been the bread and butter of advertising since forever. A vanishingly small percentage of people are anywhere close to as rational as they think they are when buying things. Many of the most self-assuredly "skeptical, rational, well-researched consumer" types get totally snowed by the simplest marketing ideas because they're looking for sales bullshit they can empirically disprove, and most marketing is influencing people in a way that makes them think they came to the conclusion independently.

zerocrates• 3 years ago

Yeah this ad has been running a lot.

I was pretty sure when first seeing it that they'd already gotten in trouble for their last ads that used the word "free" a lot, and this was a very direct response to that... I guess that's just the final decision that's being reported on here.

xyst• 3 years ago

How this ad got green lit, distributed to various mediums (tv ads, yt channel, social media), and nobody saying “wait, this is terrible” is unfathomable to me.

thegrim33• 2 years ago

Well, I mean, that extends to pretty much all advertising nowadays. It's all completely awful. A while back I saw a CGI cookie hop up on a table and twerk its animated cookie ass at the camera to rap music, on public television, in order to sell cookies. How many people were involved in making something like that, and all agreed that this was how they wanted to sell cookies. The same mentalities are built in to most companies now, it's all downhill from here.

CatWChainsaw• 2 years ago

Just remember all the other tone-deaf commercials that have ever been released. They all passed teams of people saying "this is a great idea."

Imz4di• 3 years ago

TurboTax is marketing to the kind of people who think getting big refunds is a good thing. That's generally people with lower incomes, so this fits that target.

xivzgrev• 3 years ago

It is generally a good thing for folks who live paycheck to paycheck. Higher withholding forces more budgeting, and then they get a big paycheck once a year to pay off whatever

to11mtm2• 3 years ago

I think there's some segment of folks that get snatched up into the weird false pretense that a modern day turbotax filing is less than (at worst, once one factors personal time cost in) a decent tax person even at one of the, shall we say, 'established turn and burns'[0]

That said, TurboTax did hit a specific level of 'eww' when I started seeing the refund option of a debit card (of course for some stupid fee that, if nothing else, provides some transparency to their kickback from the issuer).

I'm going to be doing what might be my last filing with them this year; it's easier for the purposes of history/other events but after that, it's gonna be my Fiancee's CPA.

Originally, I got 'started' when it was a desktop app only, and the user limit was very graceful, my parents and all of my siblings could benefit from that one yearly purchase...

Come to think of it, we should probably capture that date in the historical timeline of Enshittification.

And, yaknow, I'll ask my dad this weekend how he's doing his taxes this year. I'm honestly curious if he's finally fed up with their antics too... (It's a high bar; in the past he learned the basics of virtual machines to use some of his old-school software/tools, it's a beautiful level of curmudgeonry. OTOH my siblings have good CPAs.)

[0] - Not to be confused with some of the weird 'chop shop' Tax places I have seen around me in the past, sort of 'pop-ups' with a statue of liberty wearing person or 'wacky inflatable arm-flailing tube-man' to help drive business in.

supertrope2• 3 years ago

This is distressingly common in marketing. "0% APR financing for well qualified buyers." Where well qualified means 720 FICO score, lower debt to income, and lower payment to income ratios. These details are not even in the fine print of the ad. Then there's ads that show a picture of the high end version of a product with text "starting from <low price>!" (that corresponds to the base model).

garciasn• 3 years ago

Less than a 720 FICO score is “fair” with 720 being “good”. I’m sorry but “fair” doesn’t make you a well-qualified buyer IMO, so I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make.

diogenescynic• 3 years ago

I saw the exact same ad today.

llacb47• 3 years ago

That is… unsettling.

rconti2• 3 years ago

I've only ever used the installable version of TurboTax, and I knew up front that I'd have to pay for CA filing.

How transparent is the web site version? Do you have to spend an hour entering all your tax info just to find out that you'll have to pay to file? Or are they pretty good about notifying you up front?

In the paid installable version, I can still print out my CA tax return and mail it in to avoid paying the e-filing fee, but I'm not sure how that works with the web version, either.

daft_pink• 3 years ago

You knew you would have to pay for the ca version, but did you know how much you had to pay at the beginning. I buy the disk at Costco every year and feel the pricing is anything but transparent and they are very misleading. It includes the state free but only paper file and $10 credit for a mystery price state return

rconti2• 3 years ago

Ah good question! Of course I knew in future years, but I'm not sure I knew up front.

keepamovin2• 3 years ago

Finally! This is only 30 years too late. Also, let’s hope the IRS’ current beta of self filing app is successful.

bubblethink2• 3 years ago

This will get stayed during the appeal, so status quo will remain for this tax season. And next year there are many new variables, potentially a new government, SC's Chevron ruling which may limit what FTC can do, etc. I don't think this is going to stick.

Guvante2• 3 years ago

Honestly it might not. It sounds like Intuit already has prepared advertising that fulfils the requirements from threads here.

MikeTheGreat2• 3 years ago

Could you say more about the "self filing app"? A quick Google search didn't turn up anything (which probably says more about my current lack of sleep than anything :) )

daswerth2• 3 years ago

https://www.irs.gov/about-irs/strategic-plan/direct-file

Not to be confused with IRS Free File

bobro2• 3 years ago

What was happening 30 years ago? I would have guessed the online filing stuff and advertising based on "free" was much more recent?

keepamovin2• 2 years ago

Unfortunately, Turbo Tax has been around for a long time doing this kind of "scam". It predates any particular channels they sent this scam on, tho. Hahah! :)

ryukoposting• 3 years ago

If the IRS had the budget to run those ridiculous "free free free" ads from a couple years ago, TurboTax would cease to exist.

apengwin• 3 years ago

Increasing the IRS budget is an unequivocal good!

tasty_freeze2• 3 years ago

50% of the country believes tax is theft, and they also imagine if there were no taxes and the IRS abolished we'd somehow still continue to support an army, have a federal court system, a patent office, etc, etc, and that their state will continue to get federal subsidies.

That was the entire point of Obama's speech that republican news sources and libertarians eviscerated him for: "You didn't build that". He wasn't saying that you didn't build your business; he was stating you didn't build all the infrastructure that allowed you to build and run your business, and that is why taxes are not theft.

There is a legitimate argument over how much taxes and what is should be spent on, but those nuanced discussions are entirely replaced by BS.

andersrs• 3 years ago

Most countries governments are crap at software yet still manage to put together a free to use tax portal with automatic filing for all but the most complex cases.

__MatrixMan__• 3 years ago

See that's what you get when your government focuses on its citizens.

Instead, US has corporations. Corporations like Intuit, which it uses to decide what its policies should be.

Oh us? We merely live here.

adaboese• 3 years ago

It is more crazy that this was allowed to continue for so long.

altairprime• 3 years ago

OpenTaxSolver should be released for US 2023 in a few days! Can’t wait. Forms and math, be still my heart.

SoftTalker• 3 years ago

It's 2024. It's beyond time for the IRS to offer free tax filing online.

You've been able to file for free on paper since forever. But again, it's 2024. Paper is not a reasonable solution for either filers or the IRS in 2024. It's difficult to handle, error-prone, and all the software they use to validate paper forms could be repurposed to accept online forms.

And the online forms should be pre-filled with all the information the IRS already has about your income for the prior year.

It's not acceptable to have to pay companies like Intuit (and give them all your personal financial information) for software to file an individual tax return. I don't care if you're wealthy or poor, this should be free and provided by the IRS.

Contact your representatives. Demand that they get it done.

throwawaymaths• 3 years ago

Uh, you know that it's a thing starting this year?

https://www.cnn.com/2023/10/17/politics/irs-free-tax-filing-...

Antrikshy• 3 years ago

TIL! Fortunately, my state (Washington) is on the list. Unclear when it will be ready for use. Anyone know? I just signed up for their newsletter.

mfi• 3 years ago

In Sweden, for most citizen the tax authority does the tax declaration for you. If you don't want to do any changes (which most people doesn't have to), you simply write a text to them [1].

[1] https://skatteverket.se/servicelankar/otherlanguages/inengli...

midasuni• 2 years ago

How do private shareholders make a profit and thus increase the gdp from that?

satao• 2 years ago

by freeing people from wasting money on rentseekers and letting them spend money on more productive things?

redrove3• 2 years ago

To be fair, in Sweden the taxes are also insane. I’d rather have to pay some middleman a paltry sum every year than pay 30% more tax just for the privilege of the government automatically calculating them for me.

Not saying the US shouldn’t do this automatically, I’m merely pointing out it’s not a 1 to 1 comparison.

consp• 2 years ago

If you include healthcare, daycare, state pensions, disability insurance, employment insurance etc as a tax (which it is in most cases with more tax) the "insane" amount isn't that insane anymore.

maelito• 2 years ago

More or les insane that say, the cost of private health and private education in the US ?

doikor• 2 years ago

What does the tax rate and prefilling tax forms have to do with each other? The system would work the same with 1% and 99% tax rates too.

didntcheck• 2 years ago

To 1-up a bit, in the UK (and probably several other countries) you usually do nothing at all. The tax is deducted by your employer at time of pay and you just get annual statements that you usually do nothing with. If you are due a refund (e.g. salary went down so your projected yearly income was wrong), you usually get refunded automatically by giro or cheque (or possibly compensatory tax code changes for the next year. Not sure)

Zambyte• 2 years ago

While they're at it, they should go after services that include "free benefits" as a part of the service. The word "free" occurs 24 times in this list of what you get access to by paying $150 a year: https://web.archive.org/web/20240123132728/https://www.amazo...

tiltowait• 2 years ago

This has always driven me nuts. At an old job, I got my boss to stop doing it, which felt like a nice victory.

mrandish2• 2 years ago

The part of me that reveres clear, concise, correct communication appreciates any effort to encourage factual correctness. However, the cynically jaded part of me concedes that this battle has already been lost - at least in the public sphere of communication (eg politics, advertising, journalism, social media, corporate comms).

Anyone paying attention already knows that anything of value you don't pay for directly will have indirect costs, most often in the form of strings attached, advertising, upsells and annoyances. Today, whenever I hear something offered for "Free" it immediately implies two things. First, any actual value on offer is relatively low (or net negative), and second, the entity offering it has made a choice to obfuscate the true cost for reasons I'd need to understand before engaging.

This means I probably don't want it and even if I might want something like the promise of it, I'd have to navigate and parse a maze of obfuscation crafted by someone who's already not being entirely upfront with me. Since A) I generally value my time (and related intangibles like vendor grief, inconsistency, etc) more than my money, and B) I've learned I'm usually not happy with the lower cost versions of things that matter to me - I've adopted a default stance of "I don't want anything that's free". It's possible I'm some kind of oddball outlier but I don't think so. In fact, I'm fairly confident a good chunk of the highly-desirable "reasonably affluent consumer" segment are similarly jaded and now associate any offer pushing "FREE" in the top-line with a negative connotation.

zelon88• 2 years ago

There is a negative connotation with "FREE" to savvy consumers who understand, at least somehwat, the product or service they are buying. However, many consumers don't understand a) economics or b) what they are buying.

For example, look at all the Facebook posts from older people who repost things like "TODAY IS YOUR LUCKY DAY!!! SHARE AND YOU WILL FIND $10K TODAY!!!" They don't realize it's fake. They don't understand where that $10k comes from. There could be some secret hidden value stream built into Facebook that's promoting this. Maybe I'll find out later. Maybe I'll have to sit through a seminar for a timeshare. Maybe it will all be worth it.

The people who fall for this would fall for anything. The reason why it's so dangerous here, is that the IRS wants tax filing to be free. They've been trying to make it free, actually free, for years. And taxes are something that 100% of Americans have to do. So the market is literally 1*[entire population], annually. But these capitalists keep finding predatory ways to ignore the IRS and FTC. They just need to be fined so substantially that it wipes out a couple years profit. That's the only way the risk will no longer be worth the reward and these companies will stop.

onetimeuse92304• 2 years ago

Yes. As a consumer, I try to avoid "free" services and products offered by commercial entities. They almost never are. I very much prefer to pay for things.

When I learn something is very cheap or free, my first though is definitely not "what an occasion!", my first thought is to look for the fine print and start from the position of distrust.

"You will not get what you haven't paid for."

Paying for things does not guarantee good service or product, but buying things for cheap or getting them for free (from commercial entities) pretty much ensures you get crap and/or strings attached.

I can understand people who have no money trying to get by paying as little as possible for things. And I do not criticise.

mrandish2• 2 years ago

people who repost things like "TODAY IS YOUR LUCKY DAY!!! SHARE AND YOU WILL FIND $10K TODAY!!!" They don't realize it's fake.

What you're saying is, of course, correct. I personally know (and in some cases am related to) such people. However, you highlight an interesting aspect of this. I think this is one of those things that is "eternally true" in a meta sense. What I mean is that the ability of some meaningful number of humans to be stupid, gullible, silly or crazy will always exceed the well-meaning attempts of other humans to prevent negative consequences from those, apparently bottomless, intrinsically human abilities.

Obviously, there are many scenarios where it's reasonable and worthwhile to enact preventative measures, which is why we collectively do so in the form of laws and regulations. But at the same time, as a society, we need to remember that such preventative efforts will always be limited in scope due to costs, practicality and, ultimately, individual freedom to choose unwise things. At some point, being free includes the freedom to be stupid. The hard part is choosing where to draw the lines between "society will try to protect you from that" but "choose to do this and the consequences are on you." I'll never forget the bitter disillusionment I felt the day my teenaged self realized that the nature of reality is that some bad things will happen to good people and there's little we can do about many of those things other than grant Darwin Awards or turn them into cautionary tales (or both).

electrondood• 2 years ago

Good. I decided to boycott Intuit after one too many dark UI/email patterns. They lie to you in their marketing emails. To opt out you need to enter an entire page's worth of personal information (I thought there was a 1-click unsubscribe law?). Using TurboTax, I've lost count of the number of times I've gotten to the end of the process and discovered that they quietly upsold me 12 screens back, knowing that most customers just say "screw it, I'll pay the $100."

I switched to FreeTaxUSA.com last year and it was dead simple. Never going back.

Also, the only reason I used Mint was to see a net worth widget on my phone. During the forced migration to Credit Karma, halfway through being made to create an entirely new account, I found that they have no such widget. Bye.

lacker• 2 years ago

I think this is good. I rarely watch network TV, and when I do I'm surprised by how maliciously misleading the advertisements often are. Every "only $X per month" claim is undercut by something explaining that it doesn't really apply. I noticed watching the NFL playoffs that Intuit is a big abuser of this advertising technique, constantly claiming their tax filing product is free, when this is not really the case from a normal human point of view.

I would like to see "fine print" completely disallowed for video ads. Don't let people read out loud a claim like "Get your blah for free" or "For only thirty dollars a month", if that claim is only legal because the exceptions are explained in words too small for most people to notice.

olliej• 2 years ago

I feel that advertisements that say “could be free” or “up to X% off”, or similar should only be legal if the statements are accurate for the overwhelming majority of customers.

E.g you could advertise “free filing” if your free filing applied to 90% off people filing on your platform, you could say up to 20% off everything if more than 90% of expected sales are in the 19-20% range (also prohibit”sale” prices that are functionally the normal price with a fake markdown)

FTC bans TurboTax from advertising 'free' services, calls deceptive advertising

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