Why shouldn't we need software or accountants to file taxes? Just because? Or are you really just advocating for a different tax scheme, that will screw people in new and interesting ways?
Or upon further thought, you could be advocating for an automagic system with the same rules and rates of today. Already people have deductions taken straight from their paychecks, but its stupid based a number of assumptions. Then at tax time, you have to do a bunch of manual entry, even with tax software. It *should* be automagic, with a clear obvious audit trail that makes everything review-able. All income directly reported to the IRS. All mortgage payment info sent directly to the IRS. All property tax, 401 k contributions, iras, etc. Even for things like the previous energy credits could be automagic. You just have a web portal that explains and breaks down where your taxes are and allows you to see what changes various deductions and lifestyle changes will make. Of course, you can kiss privacy good by a little more. But its not information that the government didn't already have if you were filling in your taxes. It might just get some information form people that wouldn't have used it for tax deductions, for some reason.
Or upon further thought, you could be advocating for an automagic system with the same rules and rates of today. Already people have deductions taken straight from their paychecks, but its stupid based a number of assumptions. Then at tax time, you have to do a bunch of manual entry, even with tax software. It *should* be automagic, with a clear obvious audit trail that makes everything review-able. All income directly reported to the IRS. All mortgage payment info sent directly to the IRS. All property tax, 401 k contributions, iras, etc. Even for things like the previous energy credits could be automagic. You just have a web portal that explains and breaks down where your taxes are and allows you to see what changes various deductions and lifestyle changes will make. Of course, you can kiss privacy good by a little more. But its not information that the government didn't already have if you were filling in your taxes. It might just get some information form people that wouldn't have used it for tax deductions, for some reason.