The IRS reports that over ninety percent of the returns filed through March 11th generated a refund.

Since the data only runs through the first week in March, it reflects a population bias (more…)

While most of the press about the deficit reduction committee has consisted of vitriol from organized labor and delicate sidestepping from the “new right,” the news about the EITC has flown under the radar.

The Bowles-Simpson report emphasizes that tax expenditures will be a big part of new cuts to the budget. A tax expenditure is a catch-all term for any kind of give back made by the IRS for a deduction or a tax credit. Our tax code is so complex because there are so many different tax expenditures.

Those tax expenditures include the Earned Income Tax Credit. The EITC subsidizes paychecks for lower-income households. In 2009, EITC tax expenditures delivered $57.7 billion to 25 million American tax (more…)

President Obama’s new mandate that all recipients of government checks could be a game changer in the prepaid market. The policy, which makes all recipients of repeat government payments required to accept their payments through direct deposit, should put more Treasury-designed Direct Express cards in the pockets of Americans.

The new rule makes a lot of sense. The motive for this policy, reported by ABC on June (more…)

H&R Block’s Q4 Earnings Call is interesting, not just to someone who follows tax preparation, but what the changes at this company tell us about the nature of our larger economy.

Although many would agree with Woodrow Wilson that ‘what’s good for GM is good for the country, and vice versa,” it could also be said that whatever ills plague working people are sure to have an impact on H&R Block. Block is the nation’s largest tax preparer. They file one in every seven returns in the United States.

While they do have a broader range of services than some of the other chains, they still depend upon basic 1040A (more…)

JP Morgan Chase‘s decision to exit refund anticipation lending means that 13,000 independent tax firms will no longer have a means to advance their customers the cost of tax preparation.  Chase gave notice this week, with the intent to give their former partners as much time as possible to prepare for the next tax season.   RALs may not be entirely eliminated before next year, but at the same time, the marketplace is fractured. Block will have RALs, and some stores in the Jackson Hewitt and Liberty chains may as well.  The “mom and pops” will not, unless something changes shortly.

This should put pressure on policy makers to find an answer for tax settlement. It is a question that concerns not just the IRS, but also the OCC, the tax prep chains, and even consumer advocates. What is to be done?

We still can’t ignore that RALs were a problem. They were a solution to tax settlement costs, but they came at a high cost.  There were all kinds of externalities for all kinds of market players.

• They seemed to invite tax fraud.
• They created the platform for all kinds of additional fees, from “technology fees,” to “e-file fees,” to “account fees.”  The money drained the accounts of needy people, and undermined the impact of the Earned Income Tax Credit.
• (more…)