As Tax Day approaches yet again, the unwary taxpayer is faced with even more than the usual obstacles this year. For one, the libraries, short on cash, cannot seem to stock more than the most basic forms. The other forms are collated in binders with the hope that no one will simply rip them out or re-order them at random after copying - assuming that the copier is working on that day. If it is, then good luck on the quality. The libraries charge 15 cents per copy, twice the market rate, and because the price is high and quality marginal, they still lose money. Not having a functional copier of course creates the incentive to simply steal the forms and copy them elsewhere.
Of course, in theory, you can order them directly from the IRS - a week ago. So, you decide, what the heck, I'll just get on line and print them out...
Welcome to the OC library system, where internet access to the .pdf forms for Federal or State tax filing are instantly accessible - if you are a librarian, on a privileged librarian computer.
For the rest of us, loading a single, one-page form can take 10 minutes. Then, once it is actually loaded, as your blood pressure mounts, you discover that to access the "print" function takes another 10 minutes. To change any setting on the print menu then takes ten more minutes per change. You enter "2" on "copies." Then you go read a newspaper for ten minutes, as you cannot even switch to another web page - or, if you try, figure 20 more minutes lost.
On the librarian's computers, which are the same hardware, so far as I can determine, the download and the changes are virtually instantaneous, so it's not a matter of the IRS server being overwhelmed. It's a matter of the special privileges - or lack thereof - of having or not having authority. If the librarians had this kind of experience, then things would CHANGE, rather quickly, I'm sure.
If you save the .pdf to a memory stick or other device, then the sysop of the OC system, who, for a decade has devoted his life to making life difficult for the patrons - or so it certainly appears - has forbidden you from accessing it directly. Instead, you have to be clever enough to think of mailing it to yourself as an attachment. If you do, then - Voila! - it comes up and prints in a jiffy. So, that establishes that it's not the .pdf or the IRS site that is the problem. It's something that has been done specifically to screw the patrons - not the first time, nor the 20th time.
Welcome to socialism. If there is one place that should be used as an example of the horrors of socialism - or facism - it is the library system, where the patrons overload the bandwidth in general, downloading multiple movies simultaneously, as its FREE, like Russian bread under the Soviets, which was set at a price well below the cost of production, just so they could boast that everyone always had plenty to eat. People reportedly lined up with wheelbarrows to buy the super-cheap loaves to feed their hogs or cook into kitchen vodka. People line up at the library to get online, and then hog the bandwidth, naturally.
Meanwhile, complaints about the lack of basic functionality are ignored for years, and people attempting to get government forms or find a job are squeezed out by the hogs.
However, the irony is that even if you have surmounted all the obstacles and managed to print the correct .pdf file - and the printers are set up such that a simple .pdf form takes up to ten more minutes to print - then you may discover weeks later that your form is actually invalid, not because the content is incorrect, but because the IRS wants all forms to be originals that can be scanned. They warn the taxpayer - on a separate web page, of course, that you would only run accross by accident - that if he prints the form out from a computer, then he can only use it for reference, and that they may charge $50 per page penalty for any forms that do not exactly match their originals.
Guess which lobby paid for the campaigns to make it virtually impossible for the typical taxpayer to do his taxes...
That's how it works. Create a problem and then charge to fix it. That only works in a system in which market competition has been removed, but, what the heck, it's all FREE! If your time is worthless.