Tax season, everyone’s favorite time of year, is upon us once again. Counting today, you have 10 days left to tell the government exactly how much money you didn’t make last year … better hurry, time’s a’ wastin’!
I am one of the most unfortunate this year: I will be filing taxes for the very first time. Until last year, I had never had a job in the 19 years of my existence, and I hadn’t planned on getting one until I was safely out of college (naive, yes, but I was trying my best to get away with doing as little as possible).
I got my first job last March after a rather unfortunate auto accident left me strapped for cash at the worst time of the year – right after Christmas and Valentine’s Day when I had already spent most of the money I had on buying things for everyone but myself. Begrudgingly, I popped the collar on my polo shirt and dragged myself into Hollister, where some of my friends were working at the time. They assured me it was a good job, and indeed it has been an easy and enjoyable first foray into the working world. Things were sailing along quite smoothly for me until this January when I got a sinister little slip of paper in the mail.
You know exactly what I’m talking about – the W-2. I stared at it blankly for several minutes, trying to come to grips with the dismally small amount of electronic cash, deposited into my bank account, I had earned in 2005.
After the shock and depression wore off, I promptly threw it on a forgotten bench in my house and vowed never to look upon its ugly face again.
Until a few days ago, that is, when I realized taxes were due in mere weeks and I had yet to gain a firm understanding of exactly what taxes were. I noticed at the top of the W-2 that it said “Safe! Easy! E-FILE,” so I thought that sounded like it was for me. Safe, easy, and I didn’t have to sign off AIM to do it.
The ad told me to go to www.irs.gov, so I did. The problem with the IRS web site, like most government sites (and most government), is that it is overly complicated and vague and contains no valuable information.
The words “E-FILE” did not appear until the bottom fourth of the page. When I clicked those words, it took me to what appeared to be a bad government version of Google – a list of “free” web services I could use to file my taxes electronically. “Free” in this day and age apparently means “$19.95,” and that sum would be more than a fourth of what I would probably get on my return. No way, Jos.
Frustrated and confused, I asked a few seasoned veterans of the business world how they filed their taxes. Turns out my parents pay a CPA more money than I could hope of getting on my return to file their taxes, and all of my other friends just give their W-2s to their parents. Usually relying as little on parental support as possible, I could for once see why they still hadn’t learned to do this thing for themselves.
So here I am, still confused, still staring at my measly W-2.
If taxes have been a fundamental part of this country since before it was even founded, how come the government can’t tell you how to file them?
How did they expect this information to be passed down – oral tradition? Are we supposed to teach our children about the Emancipation Proclamation, how to clean your ears and how to file taxes?
That’s what my life has come to -“life, liberty and the pursuit of a proper income tax form.

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