Some of the earliest examples of writing historians have discovered include records of tax payments. And complaints that taxes are too complicated are nearly as old. Tax authorities have always tried to strike a balance between a simple tax code and a tax code that rewards behaviors they’d like to encourage.
The most effective way to do that? Give different taxpayers different ways to file — big corporations like GE may file a 40,000-page tax return, while an individual might file a 1040-EZ. But are these “easy” tax returns easy enough?
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