Here we go again.
A modest proposal:
The majority of people really do their best to pay their taxes, though you might not think so if you have been following the news lately. I’d like to suggest something the Obama Administration could do to make it easier for those of us who have household employees.
In my case, I’ve had the same babysitter for 12 years. I have to file four separate sets of paperwork: two filings annually for Social Security and medicare (a Schedule H and a W-2), another set four times a year for unemployment taxes and yet another for worker’s comp. Wouldn’t it be possible to set up something on the web where you could go and enter where you live and how much you pay your household employee? Then the website could figure out what you owe, and to whom, and collect the money.
Surely, technology exists to make this possible. It would guarantee that people don’t get caught inadvertently on the wrong side of the tax law. Just as importantly, it would assure that their employees get the benefits to which they are entitled.