The tax deadline is starting to sneak up on us as it is only a little more than a month away?

Do you have your taxes done?

I have not even started working on mine. I did install my new tax software in January. Does that count as getting started?

Thinking about the upcoming tax deadline I thought of this old editorial cartoon by Frank Andrea Miller.

Perhaps the Old Way was Unfair – But it Certainly was Simpler

Miller went medieval for this cartoon. I really like the image at the top with the Knight asking for half of  the peasants turnips. They were probably lucky if they only had to give half.

In the bottom half of the cartoon we see the familiar 1040 Form. Of course many changes have been made since 1960. But, the headaches and complicated forms are still there.

The first 1040 Form was introduced for the 1913 tax year, and was due on March 15, 1914. This year marks the 100th anniversary of the 1040 Form.

I remember as a kid watching and later helping my Dad fill out the tax forms. I learned about depreciation, interest and other tax matters as I helped him.

This was long before computers and tax software. I can remember calculating mortgage and interest payments on property that my Dad was selling to others on contract. I would use a calculator and run through the same formula over and over. Today a simple formula in Excel could be set up in less than the time it takes to type this paragraph.

My taxes are not too complicated. Getting motivated to find all the tax forms is the hard part.

I still have more than a month, so no motivation yet 🙂 Good thing it is not 1914, the deadline would have already passed.

When do you do your taxes? Are you an early bird or do you wait for the last day?

Steven