Tax Code Simplification and National Apology Act

Section 1. Short Title, National Apology, and Admission of Institutional Failure

This Act may be cited as the “Tax Code Simplification and National Apology Act” or the “We Know, We’re Sorry, We Can’t Fix It Act of 2026.”

Congress finds, with a degree of self-awareness unusual for this institution:

(a) The United States tax code is approximately 6,871 pages long. The United States Constitution, which established the entire system of government, is 4,543 words. The tax code explaining how to fund that government is approximately 3.9 million words. The government required 4,543 words to create. It requires 3.9 million words to pay for.

(b) Americans collectively spend 6.5 billion hours per year on tax preparation. This is the equivalent of 3.1 million full-time jobs doing nothing but taxes. For context, this is more people than work in the entire U.S. farming industry.

(c) The annual cost of tax compliance in the United States is estimated at $400 billion. This is more than the GDP of 170 countries. Americans spend more complying with the tax code than most nations produce in total economic output.

(d) Intuit (TurboTax) and H&R Block have spent tens of millions of dollars lobbying against free, simplified tax filing. Intuit agreed to offer free filing through the IRS Free File program, then deliberately hid the free version from search engines and steered users to paid products. The FTC later ordered Intuit to stop deceptive advertising.

(e) Numerous countries — including the United Kingdom, Japan, Denmark, Sweden, and Estonia — offer return-free filing, where the government pre-fills tax returns using information it already has. The IRS also has this information. It simply is not allowed to use it, because companies that profit from complexity have lobbied to prevent it.

Section 2. The Constitutional Word Limit

2(a). Maximum Length Provision

No single piece of tax legislation introduced in either chamber shall exceed 4,543 words — the word count of the U.S. Constitution, including all 27 amendments.

2(b). Rationale

If the Founders could establish an entire system of government in 4,543 words, including the separation of powers, the Bill of Rights, the abolition of slavery, and women’s suffrage, then Congress can explain a tax bracket in fewer than 6,871 pages.

2(c). The Length Comparison Index

The Congressional Budget Office shall maintain a running comparison of each tax bill’s length against:

Document	Words	Pages
U.S. Constitution	4,543	~15
The Bible (King James)	783,137	~1,200
War and Peace	587,287	~1,225
Harry Potter series (complete)	1,084,170	~4,100
U.S. Tax Code	~3,900,000	~6,871

The committee notes that the tax code is longer than the Bible, War and Peace, and all seven Harry Potter books combined. It is less popular than any of them.

Section 3. The Return-Free Filing Mandate

3(a). IRS Direct Filing Requirement

Within two years of this Act’s enactment, the Internal Revenue Service shall offer a free, return-free filing system for all taxpayers with straightforward returns (W-2 income, standard deduction, no itemized deductions). The system shall:

1. Pre-fill returns using W-2, 1099, and other data the IRS already receives from employers and financial institutions
2. Allow taxpayers to review, correct, and submit with a single click
3. Be accessible online, by phone, and by mail
4. Not be deliberately hidden from search engines

3(b). Anti-Sabotage Provision

No federal agency, and no legislation introduced in either chamber, shall prohibit, restrict, defund, or otherwise undermine the IRS’s ability to offer free tax filing services. This provision exists because it has happened before, and Congress is not above doing it again.

3(c). International Comparison Disclosure

The IRS shall maintain a public webpage comparing the American tax filing experience to those of other developed nations:

Country	Filing Method	Average Time to File	Cost to Taxpayer
Denmark	Pre-filled, one-click	15 minutes	Free
United Kingdom	Pre-filled, review only	20 minutes	Free
Japan	Government-calculated	30 minutes	Free
Estonia	Pre-filled, digital	5 minutes	Free
United States	Figure it out yourself	13 hours average	$240 average

Section 4. The Tax Preparation Lobbying Disclosure

4(a). Mandatory Disclosure

Any company that profits from tax preparation services and engages in lobbying related to tax policy shall prominently disclose on its website and in all advertising:

“This company has spent $[amount] lobbying to prevent the government from offering free tax filing. You are paying us because we have made it difficult for you not to.”

4(b). Lobbying-Revenue Ratio

The disclosure shall include a Lobbying-Revenue Ratio showing the relationship between the company’s lobbying expenditures and its revenue from tax preparation:

For every $1 spent lobbying against free filing, Intuit earns approximately $[X] in TurboTax revenue. This is the most successful investment in its portfolio.

Section 5. The Apology Clause

5(a). Formal Congressional Apology

Congress hereby formally apologizes to the American people for the United States tax code. Specifically, Congress apologizes for:

1. Creating a tax code longer than every major religious text combined
2. Making it so complicated that Americans spend more hours on tax prep than on education, exercise, or reading for pleasure
3. Allowing the tax preparation industry to lobby against simplification while simultaneously complaining about government inefficiency
4. Requiring Americans to calculate what they owe the government despite the government already knowing what they owe the government
5. Funding the IRS so poorly that it cannot answer its own phones, while maintaining a tax code that generates 6.5 billion hours of annual phone calls

5(b). Annual Remembrance

April 15 shall be redesignated as National Tax Complexity Awareness Day, during which:

• The IRS shall publish the current page count of the tax code
• Congress shall observe a moment of silence for the hours lost to Schedule C
• All members shall personally complete their own tax returns without staff assistance, CPA involvement, or H&R Block, using only the instructions provided by the IRS

Section 6. Effective Date and Anticipated Lobbying Response

This Act shall take effect upon enactment, though the committee acknowledges that the tax preparation industry will begin lobbying against it before the vote is recorded.

Committee Note: This bill was approved 12-22 in committee, with 22 members voting against. A subsequent review of campaign finance records revealed that the 22 nay votes had collectively received $4.3 million from tax preparation industry PACs. The 12 yea votes had received $0. The committee chair described this as “a coincidence that would be difficult to explain to a jury.”

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This bill received 12 yea votes and 423 nay votes. Exit polling revealed that all 12 yea voters had recently attempted to file their own taxes, with one describing the experience as “the moment I understood what radicalization feels like.” The tax preparation industry issued a joint statement calling the bill “an attack on consumer choice,” which the bill’s sponsor described as “technically accurate in the same way that a fire department is an attack on the arson industry.” TurboTax shares rose 3% on the bill’s defeat. The correlation was noted by everyone.