I got nailed for nearly $600 in 2006 for something TurboTax "missed." Now I do them by hand, then use the software to double-check and file.

All I know is that if the Treasury Secretary gets a pass on paying his taxes, I better get to skip mine too.

Diogenes: I got nailed for nearly $600 in 2006 for something TurboTax "missed." Now I do them by hand, then use the software to double-check and file.

i plan on doing them by hand until i'm using the standard deduction anymore, at which point i'll hire someone.

/i could still do them by hand at that point, but i'm lazy

I_C_Weener: All I know is that if the Treasury Secretary gets a pass on paying his taxes, I better get to skip mine too.

he didn't get a pass. the IRS said "hey buddy, you didn't pay your taxes, now you also owe us interest + fees" and he paid them.

hold whatever opinion you want of the man, but don't make up stupid shiat that isn't true.

His testimony acknowledged it wasn't a software problem, it was his own judgement.

P.S. if you aint cheating, you aint trying.

To err is human. To forgive is divine. I can forgive his unintended error, but are we really putting a guy who screwed up his own taxes in charge of enforcing the Tax Code?

Nabb1: To err is human. To forgive is divine. I can forgive his unintended error, but are we really putting a guy who screwed up his own taxes in charge of enforcing the Tax Code?

the IRS reports to treasury but is otherwise a generally independent entity.

i think there are more poignant reasons to question him about being treasury secretary. there was a pretty good editorial about it this morning in the new york times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/22/opinion/22thu1.html?_r=1&ref=opinion

can't really link because fark doesn't like the NYT

Control_this: His testimony acknowledged it wasn't a software problem, it was his own judgement.

P.S. if you aint cheating, you aint trying.

Grassley: Did you use software to prepare your 2001 and 2002 tax returns?
Geithner: I did.
Grassley: Which brand?
Geithner: Before I answer, I would say that this was my fault, not the software's... I used TurboTax perparer.

Yet he's almost guaranteed to be confirmed because everyone agrees he's got the absolutely right skillset for the job.

Ain't America great?

Now where's the farking article on Obama's order to close Guantanamo within a year?

I do it via software just so I can e-file easier. I don't understand why they don't make it free, it's a lot cheaper for all involved than doing everything by hand.

RemyDuron: Yet he's almost guaranteed to be confirmed because everyone agrees he's got the absolutely right skillset for the job.

Ain't America great?

Now where's the farking article on Obama's order to close Guantanamo within a year?

There have been lots of them submitted from a variety of news sites. This, as we all know, is not a news site.

RemyDuron: Now where's the farking article on Obama's order to close Guantanamo within a year?

We've discussed that all week. It's boring.

This tax thing, like everything the right wingers have been trotting out, is completely bogus. The guy has been very upfront and paid all his fees. Remember when your parents used to tell you "Don't cry over spilt milk?"

This is like that, if you want to whine about something, you had 8 years of everything you wanted, and look what happened. Let the grownups have a hand now.

/About all the snark I can muster this morning.

I use the 1040 EZ. It takes 10 minutes and I always get money back.

Alucard1191: This tax thing, like everything the right wingers have been trotting out, is completely bogus. The guy has been very upfront and paid all his fees.

You seem to omit the fact that he only started paying back taxes when he was trying to get a government job. He's untrustworthy, and someone else should be nominated.

Shouldn't conservatives be praising this guy as a hero for protesting his taxes?

Control_this: P.S. if you aint cheating, you aint trying

My accountant deeply and personally hates the IRS. I have never regretted hiring him.

vernonFL: I use the 1040 EZ. It takes 10 minutes and I always get money back.

You sound poor.

/I kid
//not really

An unintended self-employment tax problem; that I can understand, self employment tax is a PITA.

Trying to take your kids summer camp as dependent care, that's just plain lazy. Or sleazy. Take your pick.

burndtdan: i plan on doing them by hand until i'm using the standard deduction anymore, at which point i'll hire someone.

Funny, most people that you hire use tax preparation software, and most of those use TurboTax, so when you hire someone, anything you pay over the retail cost of TurboTax (you can get a copy of premier with state filing for about $50) is essentially for them to review what TT spits out.

Geithner was trying to be vague about the software, but Grassley made him get Intuit.

LocalCynic: Shouldn't conservatives be praising this guy as a hero for protesting his taxes?

I believe the rules state only in the event he were nominated by a Republican President, and not a Socialist Secret Muslim.

Nabb1: To err is human. To forgive is divine. I can forgive his unintended error, but are we really putting a guy who screwed up his own taxes in charge of enforcing the Tax Code?

Doesn't bode well. Obama would look pretty savvy if he dumped this loser and picked someone with a clean record, to demonstrate his commitment to competent government.

burndtdan: Diogenes: I got nailed for nearly $600 in 2006 for something TurboTax "missed." Now I do them by hand, then use the software to double-check and file.

i plan on doing them by hand until i'm using the standard deduction anymore, at which point i'll hire someone.

/i could still do them by hand at that point, but i'm lazy

I use H&R Block. This way I pawn the liability off on them.

Karma Curmudgeon: Trying to take your kids summer camp as dependent care, that's just plain lazy. Or sleazy. Take your pick.

I have to be honest, I would have unknowingly done the same thing. I'm not sure how it differs from regular daycare. Assuming the kids are in the proper age range, why wouldn't it count as dependent care?

Shaggy_C: I do it via software just so I can e-file easier. I don't understand why they don't make it free, it's a lot cheaper for all involved than doing everything by hand.

here ya go Shaggy

IRS Free eFile (new window)

only thing not free would be state efiling

Shrugging Atlas: Karma Curmudgeon: Trying to take your kids summer camp as dependent care, that's just plain lazy. Or sleazy. Take your pick.

I have to be honest, I would have unknowingly done the same thing. I'm not sure how it differs from regular daycare. Assuming the kids are in the proper age range, why wouldn't it count as dependent care?

The purpose of the exemption is to allow for people to pay for child-care on a tax-free basis so its not as much of a burden on two income households. When a significant portion of the cost of camp is for overnight care, that's obviously not the primary purpose of the care. Geithner should have gathered that by reading the instructions for the form, like I did when I passed over taking it because Mrs. KC doesn't have a full-time job other that being Mrs. KC, which is a pretty shiatty full-time job but doesn't qualify for tax purposes.

Shoulda used TaxSlayer.

I didn't really see anywhere in Intuit's statement that they say they actually check for this particular situation and warn the user.

But that is what the headline implies.

Huh.

3_Butt_Cheeks: Nabb1: To err is human. To forgive is divine. I can forgive his unintended error, but are we really putting a guy who screwed up his own taxes in charge of enforcing the Tax Code?

Doesn't bode well. Obama would look pretty savvy if he dumped this loser and picked someone with a clean record, to demonstrate his commitment to competent government.



It absolutely does not bode well. This was the kind of single party BS that we should all be afraid of. None of those Senators held his feet to teh fire at all. Except Bunning. (who did his job, unlike the other committee losers....Chuck Schumer especially....what a partisan hack)

Letting this guy run the Dept of the Treasury, thereby also the IRS is really bad, and Obama should say ,"Tim...bro. I can't have this stuff in my cabinet." And find another. Of course that would be tough with the slim pickens of decent talent in the Democratic party

RemyDuron: Yet he's almost guaranteed to be confirmed because everyone agrees he's got the absolutely right skillset for the job.

Everyone does not agree. I think he's a horrible choice, as do many others.

LocalCynic: Shouldn't conservatives be praising this guy as a hero for protesting his taxes?

No. The rule of law is important, even when you don't agree with that law.

KrustAsian: Geithner was trying to be vague about the software, but Grassley made him get Intuit.

That reminds me of when I was selling my first PC (an 8088 with 640 KB of RAM and a 20 MB HD). The prospective buyer was a moron and didn't care about any of that. What he wanted to know was if it would run Quicken. That was his only requirement. So I called Intuit and they gave me the specs, which were easily accommodated by my trusty old PC.

Then I called the prospective buyer, and said, "I called Intuit, and they confirmed that Quicken will run."

He replied, "You called who?"

"Intuit," I said.

"I don't understand," the guy said. "Into what?"

Yeah. Moron.

3_Butt_Cheeks: Nabb1: To err is human. To forgive is divine. I can forgive his unintended error, but are we really putting a guy who screwed up his own taxes in charge of enforcing the Tax Code?

Doesn't bode well. Obama would look pretty savvy if he dumped this loser and picked someone with a clean record, to demonstrate his commitment to competent government.

Eh, I'm satisfied with Obama's rebuttal to this, which was basically to point out that if making no mistakes, ever was an actual requirement for government office, no one would ever be allowed to run for anything, and that the idea that screwing up once somehow negates all your other experience and qualifications is one of the Things That Are Wrong With DC Culture, which is what Obama's "change" bit was mostly about in the first place.

I love how because it's an obama nominee the usual suspects are defending this guy to the death.

Bloody Templar: Then I called the prospective buyer, and said, "I called Intuit, and they confirmed that Quicken will run."

He replied, "You called who?"

"Intuit," I said.

"I don't understand," the guy said. "Into what?"

Yeah. Moron.

Did he also ask who's on first?

Karma Curmudgeon: When a significant portion of the cost of camp is for overnight care, that's obviously not the primary purpose of the care. Geithner should have gathered that by reading the instructions for the form, like I did when I passed over taking it because Mrs. KC doesn't have a full-time job other that being Mrs. KC, which is a pretty shiatty full-time job but doesn't qualify for tax purposes.

What gets me is how Republicans are now falling all over themselves pretending that the U.S. tax code is easy to understand. Whether something is the primary purpose of the care or not is a judgment call, and frankly, I'm not about to go jumping on a guy for initially seeing things differently than the IRS auditors do. But hell, what do I know? I'm just an ex-Republican.

I didn't really see anywhere in Intuit's statement that they say they actually check for this particular situation and warn the user.

The IMF tax situation is very unusual - they send a W-2, but don't pay tax directly like a US company would, and send the employee a check each year to cover their half of what would normally be paid in withholding (Social Security and Income Tax).

HOWEVER...

They also send out - each year - a form which says, clearly and unequivocally, that the employee HAS TO PAY TAXES on their pay. Instead of using the check he was sent to pay his share of his actual taxes, he pocketed it (while signing and sending in the form to the IMF which said he paid his taxes with the money they sent him to do that).

So not only did he not pay taxes for years, he defrauded the IMF for the money he kept.

If a normal person did this, they'd be looking at jail time, or (at the very least) huge penalties for non-payment, instead of the fairly minor fines and fees he paid.

...and whining "well, it was complicated, he made an understandable mistake" doesn't work, either. People with complicated taxes should go to serious tax professionals (not the corner tax store, but tax lawyers and CPAs). By not doing so, he showed a massive lack of judgment for someone at his supposed level of expertise.

It's also funny that his "mistake" was 100% in his favor. Most people, when screwing up their taxes, make a few errors in the other direction. Oops.

quantum_csc: burndtdan: i plan on doing them by hand until i'm using the standard deduction anymore, at which point i'll hire someone.

Funny, most people that you hire use tax preparation software, and most of those use TurboTax, so when you hire someone, anything you pay over the retail cost of TurboTax (you can get a copy of premier with state filing for about $50) is essentially for them to review what TT spits out.

which is fine, because they're up on current tax code and still in practice dealing with taxes. if i used turbo tax myself, i'd end up reviewing what it spits out. i don't mind paying them to review it for me.

Yeah he accidentally forgot to pay for the employer half of the taxes even-though he was getting the gross-up in his check to cover the cost of them.

Then after he got audited by the IRS for this, he accidentally forgot again to pay for years that were beyond the statute of limitations... until he was nominated for US treasury.


I don't think it's a huge deal what he did. I think it's a big deal that he's lying his ass of about it.

Jim_Callahan: Eh, I'm satisfied with Obama's rebuttal to this, which was basically to point out that if making no mistakes, ever was an actual requirement for government office, no one would ever be allowed to run for anything, and that the idea that screwing up once somehow negates all your other experience and qualifications is one of the Things That Are Wrong With DC Culture, which is what Obama's "change" bit was mostly about in the first place.

Rewarding incompetence isn't change, it's more of the same. I have yet to see anything to suggest that he saw the structural problems of free-wheeling credit default swaps, collateralized debt or the lack of meaningful credit ratings thereon. The regulation of all of those were under his purview at the New York Fed but from the best I can tell, he was happy to go along for the ride until the bubble inevitably popped. Combined that with his personal financial issues, he smells like trouble to me.

Mr.Insightful: What gets me is how Republicans are now falling all over themselves pretending that the U.S. tax code is easy to understand. Whether something is the primary purpose of the care or not is a judgment call, and frankly, I'm not about to go jumping on a guy for initially seeing things differently than the IRS auditors do. But hell, what do I know? I'm just an ex-Republican.

There is a lot of things that are complicated in the US tax code. The dependent care deduction isn't one of them.

/ex-Republican since 1995

Obama's new age of accountability! When you are a friend of the left, you don't need to follow the laws of the land.

/and then in the next breath they gripe about class warfare.

I know a programmer for TurboTax. They are having some trouble with the code for TurboTax 2010. You send the government ALL your money and they decide how much to send back.

Obama's Administration is full of firsts. We now have the first tax cheat Treasury Secretary in our nation's history.

I_C_Weener: All I know is that if the Treasury Secretary gets a pass on paying his taxes, I better get to skip mine too.

Umm he paid them. he didn't get a "pass".

You are so proud of your ignorance.

From what I heard in the hearings yesterday, this didn't sound a like a garden variety mistake, like missing a second income source. Sounded a little more complicated and once he missed it, he just assumed it was okay and didn't think about it again.

Seems like a mistake just about anyone could make.

/thus the reason for audits

Nabb1: To err is human. To forgive is divine. I can forgive his unintended error, but are we really putting a guy who screwed up his own taxes in charge of enforcing the Tax Code?

Well, Obama nominated him so it must be ok.

I'm amazed that this guy is going through. Even Bill Clinton got shiat from a cabinet nominee who didn't pay taxes on an employee. But since it's Obama, he's getting a free pass.

And if any of this were reversed and it was a BUSH nominee, then people like Corvus above and other Obama disciples would be completely trashing the nominee AND Bush. But we have to let Obama get away with anything he wants.

LocalCynic: Shouldn't conservatives be praising this guy as a hero for protesting his taxes?

Shouldn't liberals pretend this is a Bush cabinet nominee and shiat all over him?

WhackingDay: Seems like a mistake just about anyone could make.

#1 he's not just anybody, he's supposed to be taking over control of the economy

#2 he was receiving extra money in his check to pay for the taxes

#3 the IMP constantly reminds their US employees that they need to pay these taxes


If he was just a clerk for the IMF and didn't pay his employers taxes, it's one thing, when you're trying to be Sec of the Tresury, it's another.

Jim_Callahan: 3_Butt_Cheeks: Nabb1: To err is human. To forgive is divine. I can forgive his unintended error, but are we really putting a guy who screwed up his own taxes in charge of enforcing the Tax Code?

Doesn't bode well. Obama would look pretty savvy if he dumped this loser and picked someone with a clean record, to demonstrate his commitment to competent government.

Eh, I'm satisfied with Obama's rebuttal to this, which was basically to point out that if making no mistakes, ever was an actual requirement for government office, no one would ever be allowed to run for anything, and that the idea that screwing up once somehow negates all your other experience and qualifications is one of the Things That Are Wrong With DC Culture, which is what Obama's "change" bit was mostly about in the first place.

Would you accept that kind of answer from Bush? Of course not (and neither would I). Why sit there & accept it from Obama?