The Wealth of Nations

Adam Smith. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. Year of publication? 1776.

Ring any bells?

That's right.

And so maybe it's excusable. Maybe their military endeavours and heroic struggle for freedom against foreign oppressors distracted the American people from the economic lessons emanating from those same oppressors, and I should therefore exercise leniency in my judgement.

But I am not going to.

In England people don't really file their own taxes. I mean, I think sometimes they do, but generally they don't. I certainly never did In the 27 years that I lived there. In the 27 days that I have lived in America, I have.

I didn't understand the forms. I never understand forms. They use long words like "withholding" and "dependents" and "deductible", the boxes are always too small for you to write your name in (and I'm not even Sri Lankan), and I invariably find that no sooner have I "finished" the form, than I discover that it's invalid because I didn't fill it in in indigo (and if anyone can repeat the letters in four times in a row then I will be inpressed). And these forms were no different. In fact they were harder. It felt not a lot unlike my A-level pure maths exam:

"If you entered 3 in section 127b (iii), enter your average weekly salary as of April 1st in this impossibly small box.

Now subtract your forecasted charitable contributions for May through October (excluding August).

Multiply this number by the number of dependents in your household, but only if you are the supervalidatorian of your household and the number of subordinated beneficiaries in your household does not exceed the number of American automobiles parked in your drive on Tuesdays.

Divide this number by 3650. (And honestly I did not make this one up).

If you did not enter 3 in section 127b (iii), please refill the form in indigo."

And then I find out that these are just the withdrawal forms. Or the withholding forms. Or some long word beginning with w. And the real tax returns are even harder still.

In England, a helpful person in the equivalent of the IRS works out how much you owe, fills in the paperwork for you, and taxes you the right amount.

I don't think I ever grasped the significance of Smith's Division of Labour until I filled in my withstanding forms the other day. It probably took me an hour to understand the forms, and then I probably misunderstood them. And filled them in wrong.

The helpful person in the English IRS would not have had to spend the hour trying to understand the form, and he would have understood it perfectly. And he would have filled it in right. Because this is his job. And he is very good at it. MUCH better than I am.

So here's my suggestion, Mr President. Why not centralise the completion of tax returns? Sure you might have to employ a few helpful people to do it, but I reckon you would save at least as much administrative resource in no longer having to chase up ignorant Englishman who have filled their form in in the wrong colour of ink. And yes you might face some political opposition from people who are willing to trust the Government with national defence, but are unwilling to trust it with their tax returns, but I would not be surprised if that opposition melted away the moment those people realised they would NEVER HAVE TO FILL IN TAX FORMS AGAIN.

And I would be happier.

And Adam Smith would rest more peacefully.