It’s very hard to find the motivation to pay taxes to a federal government that doesn’t represent me. “No taxation without representation” drove the revolution against our original king after all…
Now that it’s clear the Federal government is just using tax money to give to billionaires, it’s going to be extra painful this year. It genuinely just feels like a protection racket now. Pay money to the ruling class, or their enforcers will haul you away to prison.
Out of curiosity, were you of voting age in 2016?
Yes, and I voted for Hillary, for all the good it did.
I ended up owning $38
fucking win! I’m not going look at the total paid in thought, it’s much much more than $1.2k
Taxes are not the problem. Billionaires grabbing the money on the other side are the problem.
Know the difference
The people most capable of carrying the tax burden are the people most likely to cheat their way out of paying taxes.
Taxes are also the problem in countries like the US and China wherein income tax only exists to remove currency from circulation. There’s plenty of other ways to do that in a digital world.
The rich would just use crypto
Lol, when I was in China, I never saw the taxes, so I’m assuming they just tax the corporations who pass down the costs by raising prices.
Like there is literally no “sales tax” in PRC, at least when I left around 2010. I also never heard my parents ever paying any “income tax”. So its probably all pre-deducted before you even get paid. When we first arrived in the US, my mom was so “frugal” that she whenever she see the “sales tax” she have like a mini existential crisis or something. 🤣
(This is in Guangzhou btw, just in case y’all are wondering)
There’s certainly taxes, I paid income tax and they revised the rates at least once while I was living there. No sales tax that I noticed but that’s not the only tax.
What city? I mean, most payments are done in cash (at least it was pre-2010), so its not like the government would have a good way to track everyone’s income. I’ve never heard of anything about “filing taxes” like the US does.
If you are a foreign citizen working in China, that could be a reason why things were different
So I googled a bit and, although Wikipedia isn’t a source, its a non-political topic so it should be accurate: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_tax_in_China
Apparantly, there is an exemption if you make under a certain amount per month, so my parents probably didn’t make enough to get taxes or they just under-reported (i mean, its all in cash so… 🤷♂️)
Yeah, but that’s not the argument you were making. You said there were no taxes.
Income tax is a tax even if you don’t pay it at certain levels. In the US if you make under something like 20k a year that is also effectively tax exempt due to low income. Doesn’t mean there are no taxes.
I said I never saw them in any visible form. Of couse taxes exist, they exist in every society.
Yeah having to do your taxes yourself is fucking archaic and stupid. They know how much you owe them. Either deduct that when people are paid (falls on the employer) or just tell people what they owe.
Well, again, the taxes are not the problem, but the bad design of the deduction process. The war on taxes, especially in the US but also in Europe, is a strategy from the right and neoliberals to cut down on social welfare and essentially redistribute money to the rich.
Taxes are good and important, but it’s difficult to figure out what to tax and by how much, and how to use the money well.
Isn’t it actually better to owe rather than have a refund? Because if they owe you, then that means they over-withheld from you paychecks throughout the year and its essentially the government borrowing money from you without any interest.
In the Norwegian tax system, if you pay too much taxes trough the year from your paycheck, you get interest on the amount you paid to much. Likewise, if you pay too little taxes throughout the year, you will have to pay interest on the amount you have yet to pay. So the system is supposed to be balanced in that regard. The interest is on the level of a savings account (3.51% annual atm), so you could make an argument that saving that in a index stock or good bond is a better ROI though, so still recommended to try to not pay too much during the year.
The US federal government pays interest. The interest rates are quarterly.
I got paid interest on a tax correction & the rate was pretty good: over 5.5 APY, better than a high-yield savings account. I’ll owe taxes on it, though.
How do you pay too many taxes? Aren’t you supposed to be able to know how much to pay?
Employers deduct a part of your salary as taxes on every paycheck (usually monthly). But how much they deduct is based on your tax profile which is created by the tax authorities. It’s typically based on expected yearly income. However, you are allowed (and encouraged) to update this number yourself.
So say you swap to a lower paid job, or work less overtime than you planned, you can change your expected annual income to reflect this in taxes paid. If you don’t however, then you effectively pay too much taxes as your employer is basing the taxes on too high numbers.
Another reason is that you may have tax deductions that only gets computed into the total when you fill out your full tax report. So if you didn’t bake those into your tax profile at the start of the year, you might get returns on your taxes (with interest).
You can also downplay how much taxes to pay through salaries, in which case you will owe back taxes when the full tax report is made.
Interesting. I presume for the average adult this wouldn’t really be an issue, unless they are switching job or working some kind of job with variable income. Unrelated question- do you like living in Norway?
Yeah, it’s not an issue for most people. I think the system works well. And the annual taxes are very simple to fill out. The report comes filled out for you, and you just need to make adjustments or approve it as is. Never had any issues with tracking or reporting my taxes.
I really enjoy living in Norway. I feel the culture and the way of life suits my preferences very well. There are of course always things one hope improves over time and things that could be better. But overall, life is good here I feel.
Taxes can get extremely complicated depending on your situation. In my relatively simple case as a contractor, I’m on the hook for calculating and paying taxes quarterly (since my employer(s) don’t do it for me). The exact amount I’m meant to pay is
yearly income/4, which means I need to predict how much I’ll earn throughout the entire year, which is impossible without a crystal ball.So I just pay what I think I’ll earn, and at the end of the year calculate the difference from what I actually earned, and either send or receive a payment from the government. From the IRS point of view, whatever interest they end up paying me is probably less than the cost of government having a cashflow issue throughout the year without those quarterly payments.
Okay well that makes a lot more sense for someone that has to pay quarterly I guess. I guess this is a US thing. Luckily I never had to do my own taxes in Canada and looks like I’m never going to have to learn, but I’m interested in US accountingd
I assume they have the same issues with waiting in the end of the year to round up stocks and other interest/dividend income.
They do give you interest, but it’s not as good as you can get from investing it elsewhere. And if you owe student loans, they can yoink your return before you were otherwise going to pay the debt.
I look at it like a non-voluntary piggy bank. I set the amount I’m going to withhold from every pay check, and anything over, gets given back. Sure it’s interest free but if you look at an actual bank, interest rates on that money sitting in a savings account is pennies. And if you’re someone who is bad at not spending your money, having it held for you with no real way to withdraw it is helpful when budgeting.
Besides, it’s easy to over pay, it’s pretty difficult for most people to net zero on tax payments without ending up owing money. And the amount you owe, could be something you hadn’t budgeted for. I owe $450 this year. I don’t really know where I’m getting that money. Most people will be less happy owing money than over paying and getting a refund.
I actually wish I could do this in Australia, for the reasons you mention (from a self-interested point of view).
I’m glad tax witholding is mandatory here though, because the government has to pay for stuff throughout the year, on services which we all benefit.
And it reduces the number of people who have illogical emotional reactions on having to pay taxes. (Much less resistance when you get a touch back, than have to pay more)
We do also pay taxes for stupid shit, like our tribute of $300 B AUD to the US for submarines. But alas, such is government spending. We can’t all agree what’s actually good.
Should have stuck with France.
What a bizarre system. Tax should be taken from your payslip. There should be no need for the individual to figure out anything, unless they are self employed.
They do deduct taxes from your paycheck. Basically once a year, you have to true up and figure the exact amount you should have paid. If that’s less than what was withheld, you get a refund.
Well plus there are taxable events that aren’t on your payslip. If you sell goods over a certain threshold. If you get a taxable distribution from an investment account. Etc. Edit: also the IRS doesn’t know about what you have that’s eligible for deduction.
It is taken from the payslip. But then they have us verify what they already know and if you make a mistake you’re punished for it! It’s bullshit.
I want so bad for the US to do it the way every sane country does it; they just send me a thing so I can make sure they’re accurate and only need to take action if they fuck up.
You can thank Intuit, the company behind TurboTax, for making taxes as difficult as possible. They spend a lot of money lobbying to make filing taxes more difficult.
Income tax always struck me as a deliberate way to make your average joe hate taxes when they could, very easily, be calculated at time of payroll without you ever being shown the “pre tax” amount.
I don’t care about seeing the amount or not. I care that I have to deliberately set up my withholdings incorrectly to hopefully not end up owing too much more at the end of the year. If I set it up accurately I would end up owing thousands more.
That’s because Republican “tax cuts” are often just a change in the withholding rate.
I’m not sure how withholdings works for your paycheque, but you request where the number is set.
If I set it up accurately
You define what’s accurate for a percentage when you set it.
Actually you define the number of deductions to with hold. The more deductions you claim, the less they take out.
Yeah, it’s a shit show over here. You kinda guess at how much you will need to pay in taxes, hold back that amount in your paycheck, and hope for the best. And if your life situation changes or the incoming government fucks around with the tax codes, your estimating will be off. Getting it down to a very small refund is the optional solution, but it’s not always as easy as you’d think.
And if your life situation changes or the incoming government fucks around with the tax codes, your estimating will be off.
That’s kinda what quarterly estimated taxes are for. At the end of every quarter, if things aren’t lining up and your estimates were too low, you can pay extra tax to bring things in line.
The estimate doesn’t have to be too precise though. At long as you pay at least 90% of what you owe this year or 100% of what you owed last year (whichever is smaller), you’ll be fine. Any less than that and you’ll be hit with an underpayment penalty.
It’s better to owe money rather than get a refund, as long as you pay enough to avoid the underpayment penalty.
I get that it’s ideal to owe, but I would rather a refund of a couple hundred dollars than owe a couple thousand. Part of the issue is inconsistent income, though. If it was just a single flat salary for the entire year that should be simple, but when you add in variable pay rates and shift differentials and shift bonuses it all gets messed up.
I totally understand. I hate owing a lot too, but sometimes I get the estimations wrong. I’ve got a fixed yearly salary, but a big portion of my pay is stock (RSUs) so the tax I owe varies based on when I sell the stock.
A lot of things suck, but setting up your withholding is easy, and in 30 years of paying taxes, I’ve never accidentally withheld too little.
I hadn’t. I’ve also withheld to much and got a warning letter from the IRS. It’s at a point now where things have been optional for the last few years. But with the new tax changes Trump is bringing in, I expect I’ll go from getting a small refund to owing a bit next year.
They already do that tho, payroll tax is paid by the employer without the employee every seeing it.
When I was in China as a kid I never saw any visible form of “taxes”. I also never heard of any income taxes. I have no idea how the tax thing works, but I’m assuming they just tax the corporations, which solves both the sales tax and the income tax at once.
(Guangzhou, PRC. Other cities might work differently I have no idea tho)
But what about the tax preparation industry? Won’t anybody think of the shareholders? For shame.
Yuuuuuuup.
That’s how it is here in France. It is calculated according to the previous year income, so if you get a raise you’ll have to pay a little bit more at the end the following fiscal year, but that’s often very little. Last time I got a 2500€ yearly raise, I had to align something like… 100€ 😆.
Why, though?
I’m in Germany and my employer kind of knows how much they pay me. So they can easily calculate the income tax correctly. It’s just assumed that each month’s salary is 1/12th of my yearly income and taxed appropriately.
You can literally live your entire life without “doing taxes” even once (though it’s a good idea for your individual deductions).
It’s the same in the UK - employer deducts the tax and National Insurance (which pays for health care, state pension etc), and most of the time it’s correct.
This year I had to do my own tax calculation because of an inheritance, and it was such a pain! But I got some guidance from the HMRC phone line and filed the return online. It turned out I owed a lot less than I’d thought.
We are taxed on more than just wages. Additionally, the way tax law is structured here, because of S-corporations and partnerships (structures which own/run companies), these both flow through activity to the individual tax payer which is then taxed at that level.
If it’s just wages, lots of Americans work 2, 3, or even more jobs (not just during the year, but at once). Our tax rate tables are set up so you calculate them based on you having one job, so when we start a job it’s calculating it at only that one income.
Even in Germany you typically get a little money back if you do your taxes as a regular employee. Though that’s far, far better than owing the state money at the of the year.
Might be because of tax brackets and not knowing ahead of time if you’re getting a raise. E.g. maybe you are the top of some bracket for most of the year, and youre on track for not surpassing it by the end of the year. Then you get a raise near the end and it bumps you over.
Should they take a huge amount off your last couple payslips? Or just let you pay it in taxes later?
Might be better for some people to pay via taxes instead of automatically losing the money for that month.
Just a guess though.
That’s a solved problem, though (and I described it in my comment). If you always assume the current month’s payment is 1/12th of your yearly salary, you already pay according to the tax bracket relevant to you. You might overpay a bit, but most people don’t double their income within a year, so the refund is typically not that much.
I agree that the employer part should be more automatic, but don’t forget it may not the the only income. You can have properties, you can have share and dividends. All that do not happen all at the same time, so it is far easier to calculate on an earlier snapshot than continuously recalculate every time something changes.
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Taxes are taken from the payslip, but there’s a bunch of other things that can affect your income taxes. For example, you need to pay income tax on bank interest and capital gains tax on investments you sold during the year. There’s also a bunch of deductions that reduce your taxable income - for example, if you have a mortgage, you can deduct some of the interest.
Of course, the IRS should already know most of this stuff, so I’m not sure why they make us tell them again.
Taxation is theft
Before the feds went fascist, this was hyperbole. Now it’s simply the truth, for federal, anyway. At least my state taxes are still being used for public benefit.
Good luck getting that tariff money to pay for local roads and schools.
I’m sure that Elon Musk will agree with you.
Two thefts make a restitution
If Americans want a proper country, yall better get used to paying 40% taxes like in Europe muhahahahah!!!
Ok, some parts of Europe…Bracketed income tax is a thing for a reason, and it is a good reason.
more income == more tax.
If I’m making less than $20k/year, there’s no reason to give a shit about my taxes, just let me live yo.
If I’m making $200k+/year, then we have a conversation on our hands.
If I’m making 2,000k+/year, then we have a problem and the conversation should have have been completed by now.
edit:
exact numbers are not relevant. if you have a functioning brain, then you know what I mean.
Don’t worry DOGE will fix that and every American will get a refund!
Know you’re joking, but just think it’s funny to point out that one of DOGE’s first acts was to try to kill the direct file system the IRS maintains to make it easier for some people to file their taxes. I feel like that one didn’t get a lot of coverage.
And they just fired a huge chunk of the IRS as well.
Yep, and this cartoon feels like America would keep voting for this stupid fascist stuff as long as they keep promising the Libertarian ideal of lower and lower taxes.
Americans trained to defund America, the enemy was inside all along.
And they didn’t even deliver on that one simple thing.
Taxes go up for every voter making less than 357,000$
Have you read A Libertarian Walks Into a Bear?
At the end of the libertarian experiment (which surprisingly ended in failure) they had almost no services in the town yet still paid as much taxes as the neighboring towns which had tons of fully funded services.
And they got over run by bears. It’s a good story if anyone wants to look it up and know more.
My favorite is that everyone had different idea what true freedom was and they kept treading on each other’s freedoms.
“the first matrix was a paradise”
… Right into Col. Musks bank account!
Colonel Musktard?
The one and only
In the country where you don’t know what you ll end up paying unless you go to the counter, because the taxes are not included, its only “logical” to not have your taxes deducted from your payslio because reasons
I ll never understand this shit, smh
I’m not sure what country you’re talking about, but I assume the U.S. We do have taxes deducted from payroll, and you fill out a form telling the employer (and the IRS) what amount to deduct based on estimated income, family size, and a couple of other factors. Then in April we have to file our official tax form declaring actual income, and if we owe less than what was deducted from our paychecks we receive that back as a refund, but if we underestimated we have to pay whatever taxes are remaining. The reason that filing taxes is so complicated is the sheer volume of deductions, exemptions, credits, etc that have been piled on top of the tax code over the years (plus lobbying by the tax prep industry). It’s a stupid system, but it’s not as stupid as some people seem to be assuming in this thread. If you set up your withholding right, you shouldn’t ever owe taxes when it’s time to file.
Now, if you’re self-employed or a contractor (and considered self-employed) the whole thing kind of falls apart and it’s a lot easier to wind up owning a bunch of money. Like I said, it is a stupid system, just not quite as crazy as some people seem to be assuming.
Yeah I’ve heard of so many content creators that stream for a living that gets absolutely screwed over at the end of the year because since they own their own business they have all of the business tax and they hadn’t been putting in throughout the year so for them tax time always hurts
To add one thing to the only reasonable comment I’ve seen in this thread: if you’re poorer, your taxes are probably easy and straightforward. If you have money and your taxes are more complicated, you can probably afford to have someone do them for you.
I can’t agree with this enough, though I think part of the problem is that it isn’t what’s easy to complete your W-4 accurately, there is an entire worksheet to use if you file jointly that is sorta difficult to do well, especially if both people make fairly different amounts. If you just choose the basic withholding it’s very likely the bigger breadwinner isn’t withholding enough and you’ll end up owing about what the comic shows (at least that is my experience, as well as some friends).
I think the real problem in the US is that everyone is left to do their tax paperwork from scratch every year when the IRS could send you a personalized return prefilled that you then claim the deductions and credits you’re due and account for any descrpenices (which sure, is what your W-2 is supposed to be, but it isn’t really that, you still need to use the worksheets on the 1040 or pay someone/some software to do it for you; a prefilled 1040 would be a way better system).
It also doesn’t account for the huge variations in state taxes. Many states have income taxes, some are reciprocal with nearby states and others aren’t, the deductions and credits and even what is taxable is all different. The whole thing is a mess. Then lord help you if you live in a state with local income taxes or one where your local taxes are different than school taxes(like PA) and the whole thing is a half day exercise in frustration to complete and you’re still left wondering if you did it right.
Yeah, I’m not by any means trying to say that the American system is the best way of doing things. It’s definitely not, and to be honest I’ve never quite managed to get my state withholding right - I almost always owe a little bit (usually a hundred dollars or so). But some folks seem to have gotten some strange ideas about how bad it actually is.
Yeah, we almost always owe a tiny bit (usually less than $100, often less than $50) to the state. I don’t really understand how I can get so close but still miss it every year but overpay federal taxes when it’s all based on the same W-4 I give to my employer.
School taxes? What is that?
The school districts get part of our local income taxes which is separate from what municipalities get (technically municipalities run wholly on property taxes, and the schools get a portion of that plus a portion of local income taxes that are split with the county. It’s convoluted IMO). It depends on where you are employed and where you live, since your employer remits taxes to the municipality you work in and that municipality remits taxes to school districts based on where each employee lives (at least that’s how I understand it, it all is mostly transparent other than needing to include various location codes on forms for your employer and for your local tax return).
I look like that mouth-hanging-open emoji right now. Convoluted for sure!
Our municipal taxes are paid directly to the local council. Education is funded by central government.
If you set up your withholding right, you shouldn’t ever owe taxes when it’s time to file.
Thing is, here in Germany you don’t even get to make the mistake of setting up your withholdings wrong if you’re a regular employee. I don’t think it’s even possible to end up owing the state money if you’re not self-employed or have considerable capital investments (which is rare for regular employees, which is probably its own issue …).
Oh for sure, I’m not trying to defend the American tax system as being good by any means - it’s most definitely not. But for most people it’s not as bad as some folks seem to believe.
Haha, my last tax filing I owed another $40k.
My own fault for not paying taxes during the year though.
How fucked are you if you don’t file?
I didn’t file last year, because I’ve been in a clusterfuck of borderline homelessness and odd jobs for the past two years. Idk if I am even able to file this year if I didn’t last?
It sounds like you aren’t making much money, so you probably don’t owe much, if any, in taxes. For the year 2024, if you got a W-2 from your employer, you should file. What you did in previous years won’t affect your ability to file this year. Who knows? perhaps you will get a refund.
if you’re making money and don’t file, it’ll catch up to you. If you’re poor and don’t file they will make your life harder when you try to collect social services
Big part of it was the surprise illegal eviction my ex got to do when he wanted to move in his prostitute (cops in OK don’t give a shit about your rights if your trans lol). Navigating the divorce system with no money, all the paper work that I have no idea if survived the parents guest room -> friends couch -> apartment.
There aren’t social services here anyway at least lol
I wish you the best, friend. Maybe when you get your feet under you, the land should be a different place? Washington State will treat you much differently but you would have to deal with the weather change…
Income amount that requires you to file
If you were under 65 at the end of 2024
If your filing status is: File a tax return if your gross income is: Single $14,600 or more Head of household $21,900 or more Married filing jointly $29,200 or more (both spouses under 65) $30,750 or more (one spouse under 65) Married filing separately $5 or more Qualifying surviving spouse $29,200 or more https://www.irs.gov/individuals/check-if-you-need-to-file-a-tax-return
I’ve had to work with the irs a few times in my life and they were always reasonable and understanding. I lost everything and had to scrounge up $200k by selling off a business and everything but a shirt off my back and they never charged interest or late fees because I always answered their calls and kept them updated on what was going on. I know many others have had different experiences but the two times I was in deep shit and desperate times I walked away with a positive experience from the irs.
If you live in the USA then the government didnt decide to keep making it worse, the people did.
GOP wrote the last tax plan and they’re about to write the new one.
This is why I don’t blame the politicians. I blame the people
Democracy is dead in the digital age. It’s a non-functional and corrupt system incapable of representing or addressing the majority’s actual needs properly. The US has fallen before many European democracies, but they will crumble under the weight of AI-powered digital disinformation and manipulation too.
The people are partially to blame, but let’s be real, the voting system practically guarantees voter disenfranchisement.
It’s how the US has ended up with the far right, and right-lite-maybe-a-little-good-stuff-but-mostly-capitalism-status-quo party duopoly.
Blame the people who pay off the politicias and put rightwing propaganda on almost all mainstream media. Common people have to spend a LOT of effort to get even a resemblance of agency.
Funny story, the people also chose not to pursue campaign finance laws. It’s been an issue on the DNC platform for 25 years, they even successfully removed the vast majority of money from politics until the Citizens United SCOTUS decision undid their work.
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Hahaha no. That would be too easy. Americans, please correct me if I get any of this wrong:
The IRS knows how much tax each American owes, but each American has to fill in a needlessly complicated and obscurely worded form (or set of forms) outlining their incomings and outgoings and then calculate the tax they owe for themselves, and then take steps to pay that amount.
And if they get it wrong they are punished.
There’s software that helps with the needlessly complicated paperwork, but the company that makes it is in cahoots with the IRS, and so buying a copy or hiring an accountant are all-but necessary to get it right and not be punished.
This is largely the reason it stays the way it is, because an entirely unnecessary industry is being propped up by the struggles of American taxpayers.
Oh and sometimes the IRS gets their internal calculations wrong, and if you don’t get what they got, you have many, many hoops to jump through to prove that what you did was right and what they did was wrong.
The American Dream™
you are solid with the exception of needing a tax advisor(it’s actually super simple if you are a typical w2 worker), and that the IRS is not in kahoots with the tax companies, they actually were up until Trump became president working on a free tax submission system that didn’t require you to put any values in, because trying to get anywhere with passing anything better was met with massive lobbying from those tax companies.
Of course trump fired the entire dev team working on it almost immediatly, but it’s still up /for now/ just likely isn’t going to be worked on anymore
This government doesn’t deserve our tax dollars. Theyve made it clear they’re funneling as much as possible straight to the billionaires.
Just don’t pay.
And what would that do?
They already run a deficit, so they’ll run a bigger deficit. Printing money is a flat tax on everyone. So not paying taxes is just applying a flat tax on others.
Plus you get to go to jail and cost me money to support you there.
I’m all for effective protest, but this doesn’t seem to be it.
(Stupid question) Why would they print more money instead of just having a higher deficit until congress increases taxes on the poor?
It’s the same thing really. When they run a deficit, they’re paying money to somebody, so that money enters circulation causing inflation.
I’m getting a $10,000 refund for federal income tax (overestimated when paying my estimated taxes), but I owe $9,500 for Californian income tax. <_<
