You appear to be conflating R&E expenses (Section 174) with the R&D credit (Section 41).
Everyone knows taking the R&D credit (Section 41) is optional, that's not what is being discussed here.
The actual question is: if you have incurred software development expenses (e.g. wages paid to software developers), are you required to treat them as R&E expenses under Section 174, or can you instead treat them as ordinary expenses under Section 162?
At first I thought OP was talking about the credit. But I have since updated other comments. In short, use of software to support your business is different from “Software R&E”. Use section 162 not 174. It’s only R&E if you’re frolicking around on the keyboard playing with software for fun, which I doubt any serious business is doing outside of occasional true research. Cost to operate your business is OPEX.
> In short, use of software to support your business is different from “Software R&E”.
Of course the cost of using software to support your business is already deductible as an ordinary business expense. Just to be clear, the discussion in this thread is about the deductibility of the cost of developing software.
> Use section 162 not 174.
The point of the discussion is that it's not actually clear whether this is still possible (for software development costs) after the TCJA changes went into effect in 2022. Please see my sibling comment here for further elaboration: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34634335. (In short, the TCJA rewrites Section 174 to imply that it now supercedes Section 162 for the purpose of software development costs.)
Either way, the situation does not appear to be as cut and dry as you seem to be suggesting.
Everyone knows taking the R&D credit (Section 41) is optional, that's not what is being discussed here.
The actual question is: if you have incurred software development expenses (e.g. wages paid to software developers), are you required to treat them as R&E expenses under Section 174, or can you instead treat them as ordinary expenses under Section 162?