> They persuaded the Internal Revenue Service for more than a decade to pledge in writing not to adopt California’s innovation or develop any other offerings that threatened their business model.
I think the IRS deserves much of the blame for yielding to Intuit's persuasion.
Every American should be upset with both Intuit and the IRS.
This isn’t the fault of the IRS. The IRS can only do what Congress allows them to do. It’s the fault of Congress. In fact the 2 key Congresswomen responsible are Zoe Lofgren and Anna Eshoo. I currently live in Eshoo’s district but I can tell you she is completely unresponsive to you if you don’t live in Atherton or Palo Alto. I have never seen her campaign once. Her district is sprawling and includes 3 counties in the Bay Area and communities that have almost nothing in common. Her district includes Atherton, Menlo Park, Palo Alto, MountainView as well as South San Jose and Scott’s Valley. The district is designed to ensure she never has to face a re-election challenge. It’s almost impossible to enact change with the way this system is arranged.
Geez. She is still there? I remember writing her 16 years ago when I was at Stanford and had an issue. Of course neither she (nor her office) ever bothered to respond. Wow.
What your saying implies that the entire congress is responsible as everyone is accepting deals to look the other way… maybe you need to reevaluate what your writing?
> What your saying implies that the entire congress is responsible as everyone is accepting deals to look the other way… maybe you need to reevaluate what your writing?
There is a strong contingent in Congress that believes that it is only moral for it to be annoying and expensive to pay taxes, as they believe that taxes should be opposed by the masses. If taxes are too easy then people won't think about them, and will simply enjoy the services the government provides with them, which is tyranny.
This is also why the US keeps sales tax separate instead of rolling it into the price of the item like Europe.
Not all states preclude including sales tax in advertised prices. According to this website, https://www.taxjar.com/blog/retail/can-retailer-include-sale..., and by a quick count, at least 20 states permit combined pricing without any more limitation than a posted sign. That count excludes states which only permit it for a limited set of products and services, or which require sales tax to be itemized on the receipt.
Perhaps you're confusing VAT vs sales tax, which is an entirely different issue, and while some politicians might prefer a sales tax on the presumption of its conspicuousness, the real debate regarding adopting VAT is far more complex. VAT does seem to be the darling of many economists, but those economists also tend to overlook the fact that Europe has significantly larger grey and black markets, as well as more tax evasion, than the U.S.; and some of that difference is arguably a consequence of the mechanics of VAT and the general preference for hiding the taxation system from individuals.
It's also worth noting that there are good reasons for itemizing sales tax separately. For example, for individuals state sales tax can be deducted from federal income, but not the cost of the item itself.
> This is also why the US keeps sales tax separate instead of rolling it into the price of the item like Europe.
Even in a relatively federalized (by European standards) country like Switzerland, the VAT is set nationally. This isn’t the case in the US, and several states even have different sales tax rates in each city. It would be a considerable logistical mess to coordinate integrated sales tax signposting, both from a business and consumer perspective. Amazon already handles this somewhat awkwardly by changing store prices if you set your location on Amazon.de to Switzerland, with the prices somewhat unpredictably changing if it decided to remember your location preferences, and no longer following common numbering conventions (e.g. x.99).
> If taxes are too easy then people won't think about them, and will simply enjoy the services the government provides with them, which is tyranny.
Nope. More like we don’t want the gov to have their hands directly into our pocketbooks. The left are the ones that want more taxes and this auto income tax feature. The right wants less taxes. Understand people want different things and quit trying to force people your way. A great many people do not want the gov in their personal business.
Intuit is lobbying in defense of their entire industry. Almost every company of their size would do the same thing in their situation. The people who deserve the blame here are the people who are susceptible to those lobbying efforts.
Why don’t we blame the intuit employees while we’re at it? If they had no employees then they wouldn’t be in business? So does this mean it’s actually the citizens fault?
This is entirely too cynical and pessimistic. In particular others have pointed out that other countries do not do this, and it’s not like they aren’t people.
Isn't the IRS just executing the policies that elected politicians decide? It seems the IRS wanted to do the right thing 20 years ago, but they were stopped by politicians who were corrupted by lobbyists.
Maybe US people should elect politicians that represent them instead of business. And stop buying the incredible amounts of double-speak that is always present in discussions like these.
Yes. I should restate... I'm not mad at low-level IRS employees. Rather the ones nominated and approved by Congress, who ultimately make these decisions.
There is a school of thought, and I tend to agree with it, that "a position of public trust" is exactly and specifically what is granted to a corporation by granting it its special, fictive-person, liability-shielding status. The veneration of "corporations as psychopaths" is more of a deification of the current state, not an aspirational one. It doesn't have to be that way, and so we absolutely can fault Intuit for acting against that public trust. Intuit has responsibilities to the society that grants it its charter, and that includes not peeing in the public pool.
(That school of thought, yeah, puts most companies in a real bad light. And? Well? Yes. They have earned it.)
> granted to a corporation by granting it its special, fictive-person, liability-shielding status.
There is no such thing. This is such a silly argument made by people who have no understanding of corporate liability laws.
Incorporating doesn't suddenly shield you from liability. If you were negligent or intended harm, you will be held personally liable. If you're a shareholder and knew what was going on, you will also be held liable. The issue is not incorporation, it's a government too timid to enforce the law.
I'm well aware of how corporate liability laws work, thank you. Intuit advocating to indirectly damage the body politic to increase their profits is not negligence. It is also wrong. The divide, and the hole in the modern theory of the corporation, is obvious when one is not hiding the cards.
It is a moral failure and a failure of social distinction, not a legal one. I understand why that shorts your circuit. It exists nevertheless.
I expect Intuit, and every other company where responsibility is sufficiently large that nobody feels personally responsible for the company's actions, to do heinous things to make a buck if the option presents itself.
Whereas the IRS, and every other government agency, is supposedly trying to help society or at least not hurt it.
> They persuaded the Internal Revenue Service for more than a decade to pledge in writing not to adopt California’s innovation or develop any other offerings that threatened their business model.
I think the IRS deserves much of the blame for yielding to Intuit's persuasion.
Every American should be upset with both Intuit and the IRS.