The Justice Department’s Antitrust Division has been on a litigation binge lately. One new case involves a challenge to the proposed merger of H&R Block and TaxACT, two of the three largest tax preparation companies in America. Division boss Christine Varney gave a lengthy spiel about the need for competition in this oh-so-important market:
This morning, the Department filed an antitrust lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., to prevent H&R Block from acquiring TaxACT. We are blocking this transaction because the proposed merger would substantially lessen competition in the tax preparation software market, resulting in higher prices, lower quality and reduced innovation.
Between 35 and 40 million taxpayers use software products to prepare and file their federal and state income taxes. Three companies account for 90 percent of all sales of consumer tax software products. Combining H&R Block and TaxACT would destroy the head-to-head competition between these two companies, leaving only one other major competitor.
Despite Varney’s typical economic ignorance about how competition actually works — she can’t fathom a yet-unknown competitor entering the market — it’s hard for even me to get worked up over a case involving a market that wouldn’t exist in the first place if not for the state. After all, people buy tax preparation software because (1) they are forced to pay taxes and (2) the government has made tax rules too complicated for most people to understand without outside assistance. If Varney really wanted to help consumers, she’d either demand Congress and the IRS simplify the current income tax, or better yet, abolish it altogether.
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Well, yeah, but then what would all of us geeks who played too much Dungeons and Dragons in the ’80s and understand byzantine rules systems like the back of our hands do for a living?
Okay, now my write-off amounts are equal to my Strength bonus plus my experience modifier or my bracket percentage?
It’s Strength + 1/2 Constitution. And if you have a Girdle of Tax Calculation, you also get a +3 modifier bonus. Just avoid the IRS Audit, that creates a -2 penalty.
I think what you really need is a Sword of Vorpal Deduction. You could put your remaining gold in your Bag of Offshore Holding, and if you can cast Irresistible Dance on the Greater Death Auditor, you may just be able to slip out the back dungeon door before the Warlock of Inflation destroys all.
Doesn’t TurboTax have a huge share anyway? What’s the problem? And then you have the huge accounting firms. Anti-trust really is nothing more than let’s go after the companies we don’t like.
Yes, any time there is a concentration of power, others will find ways of gaining control of it, so they can gain control over much more than their own property.
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