Got 1.5% raise after a year at job. Now what? - <AUTHOR> I am a software developer and I started work at a company and after a year got a raise of about 1.5%! Manager's reason: company performance/department performance. That's lower than inflation. So basically my purchase power is less than last year.
Two questions:
1- Do companies usually give a raise of at least the inflation rate or it's whatever they feel like it even if it's pretty low?
2- I feel I want to have a talk with my manager before the next year raise particularly saying I wasn't happy with the earlier raise.
How do I communicate to the manager that if the company is going to give low raises again, I am going to be pretty unhappy. I want to let him know that I will consider leaving the job without telling this directly to him.. or should I tell him? They like my work but I don't know if I am dealing with a company that has the attitude of "If you don't like it, leave the company". It's a big public company.
I like the company and it will be pretty hard to find something better. Better to me are a few things other than salary. My salary is above average and it will be hard to find companies with matching or better salaries. So I feel I am kinda stuck. I don't want to move to another city.
If they keep keep giving me such raises, I will feel they are using me.
What do you guys do in such situations? <comment><USER2> I'm on job #3 since graduating from college 10 years ago. The average raise amount I've gotten each year staying at a job has been 3.7%. The average bump in pay I've gotten changing jobs has been 15%. This is despite receiving an excellent performance rating every year, for 10 years, at each of the jobs. The reality of the job market today, especially at big public companies, is that the framework in which they operate does not allow them to give large awards to good performing employees.

Usually the only way to increase your pay is to get another job or threaten to leave your job if you don't get a raise. Threatening to leave is generally a one-shot deal and will probably paint a permanent target on your back.

My sad advice to maximize earnings is to stay at a job for 2-4 years then move on for a 15-20% pay raise.

<comment><USER3> Why do you feel sad about this advice?

<comment><USER2> For a couple of reasons:

1\. You may find yourself doing work you enjoy and have a great boss but realize the pay is no longer competitive (and has no potential to ever become competitive). There's risk in leaving and landing in a place where the work sucks and you make a lot more money, but is it worth it? It's sad to leave work you enjoy knowing your boss desperately wants to reward high performers but is stuck playing a shell game with an arbitrarily fixed award pool.

2\. I've come to realize that, even to engineering companies, doing good work is rarely the thing that leads to rewards (promotions, bonuses, raises, etc.). You'll do great work that is very valuable but watch some idiot politic his or her way into a position of influence and get rewarded for it. I used to think this was just an isolated incident but now that I'm on job #3 I understand this is just how the world turns. So when you go to look for a new job to get your 20% raise, unless you have a source to tell you how it really works on the inside, there's no way of knowing if doing good work is the thing that will be rewarded at this potential future job.

3\. If you're good at getting things done and leading others you'll inevitably accumulate leadership tasks. So you'll be doing your work but also naturally end up leading the team around you. Many companies have specific slots or job titles allocated to "team leads" or similar. Unfortunately, these positions rarely go to anyone who is new (<5 years at the company). Of course everyone knows that it's rarely worth ($) staying at a job for more than 2-3 years, so who gets the leadership positions?

People who:

(1) Stay because they like their job and don't care to make more money (these people may or may not have any leadership ability)

(2) Want to leave to make more money but cannot find a job anywhere else

(3) Have some arbitrary characteristic, unrelated to actually doing any real work, the current leadership finds very important (Example: The VP of a large division wants more clout at conferences so they hire and promote PhDs into leadership positions. Why? Because within their award framework the only way to reward them is through promotions.)

This is sad because if you'd really like to stay in that "team-lead" position, or move into project management, every time you take a new job you have to start over. You get better at convincing your new boss/coworkers you're capable of this work but it's difficult to go from engineer at one company to team-lead at another. And realistically, if you never stay at a job for more than a few years is it worth promoting you into leadership positions? It's a catch-22.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Step 1. Start quietly looking for another job that pays 20% more than you currently make. You'll likely find something.

Step 2. Take the new job.

Rationale for not making a stink with your current employer or negotiating with them once you have an offer:

1\. right now you likely feel some combination of under appreciated, used, taken advantage of, etc. and that feeling likely won't change as time goes on. You are likely not wrong for feeling that (even if you suck and are lucky to not be fired). The compensation system didn't meet your expectations and there is really no way to remedy that.

2\. Current company will likely not match a 20% bump and if they do it will further the aforementioned feeling of being taken advantage of.

It's time to move on.

</comment><comment><USER5> You get raises in this industry by changing companies. Nobody will ever give you more than a few percentage points as part of a standard end-of-year review.

It sounds like you might not have known this before, so at least now you do. It doesn't help to complain about it to your manager. They know what they are doing. And they'll know why you left when you do.

If you are better now than you were when you started, then it might be time to start interviewing. Take a new gig that pays more. Repeat every couple years until your market value is where it needs to be.

It's a sad state of affairs, but in absence of any way to change it, the best thing to do is act accordingly.

</comment><comment><USER6> Somebody up the food chain had xyz budget for raises. They made a spreadsheet with 3 column last years salaries, 2% of that salary and new pay. hten they started tweaking it. Well, I can't lose jim and he's in the top 1/3 pay band he deserves 2.5 where's coming from? Peter going to fall below the 20% pay band range so I need to give him 3% so he doesn't fall out of the range. Shit, Tony's in the top band and he's doing pretty good so will give him 1.5% that'll offset bigger raises for jim and peter.

</comment><comment><USER7> I've taken similar pay cuts in the past. It does suck. The answer almost always is to let your boss know (very gently) that you expected more. If they say no, start looking (casually) for a new job. If you can find one that pays more, either take it or show your boss the offer letter and ask for a better raise. If you can't find one that pays better, then yeah, you're getting the best you can. Either increase your skills and build your resume until you can find one that pays better, or just figure out if money is the ultimate goal or if there's something less tangible at the company that makes you happy.

I stayed with a company after they gave me a 0.25% raise in a year. I stayed because I loved the company. As soon as that was not true, I started looking for a place with a similar benefit package but a higher salary, and I found one. Talk to your boss very casually. Don't demand more money, but let them know you expected more and ask what you could do to earn a better raise in the future. If there is nothing _you_ individually can do that will impact your future earnings potential at the company, that company is just a short-term step on your long-term career roadmap. Enjoy it while it lasts, and keep one ear to the ground for better opportunities in the future.

</comment><comment><USER8> Find a new job. Biggest raises I ever got were when I quit and looked for a new job.

My second job after graduation actually meant almost 100% pay raise. After that it slowed down but I still usually get extra 10-20% every time I switch jobs.

</comment><comment><USER9> Not sure if I understand your situation. You're both not happy with your salary and you won't be able to get a job in another company that pays better.

I would be pretty happy if I were in your situation.

<comment><USER7> A raise of 1.5% is basically a pay cut over last year. Sure he may be getting overpaid compared to competitive salaries, but they offered him a certain amount of money last year. This year they're basically paying him less than they did last year.

It's completely possible to be overpaid and also unhappy with your salary. Inflation exists, and nothing is immune from it. A pay cut is still a pay cut.

<comment><USER9> Inflation was 1.3% last year. I wouldn't call a 1.5% raise pay cut.

<comment><USER7> Hm, you're right. I hadn't realized inflation was so low last year.

I stand corrected, but I think the (corrected) statement holds true. Maybe not for this particular case, but if you get a raise that's less than inflation (or no raise at all), you're taking a pay cut and have every right to be upset.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I say this a bit tongue in cheek because a large Corp doesn't think like this, but did you add more value to the firm in the past year than the first six months? If not, why would you expect to get a raise above inflation? At smaller firms if I had the work record to back it up raises were actually negiotable. Bigger firms not so much. I once worked for a big bank. Before I started outsiders told me 2 "law's" that ended up true. 1) Get paid as much as you can up front because your pay will never change year to year by more than 4%. Starting salary is an anchor with very thick chain. 2) The severence package is awesome than so old timers won't leave voluntarily. Made for a really unhappy workforce. Good times.

</comment><comment><USER11> Raises are basically useless to depend on these days as a way of increasing your income. In my 15 year career, I have seen an average of 2-3% raise and the highest I have seen is 10% when I got promoted. The fact that your salary is above average also plays against you, as most big companies have a formula for raises that is based on local market salary for a similar role. If you want to make more money, moving jobs, or getting promoted is the way to go, not raises. Another thing to consider, you have been in this role for only 1 year. Establishing trust takes time. If you are a rockstar developer, ask for more responsibility and get on the promotion track.

</comment><comment><USER12> If you are paid above average, it will be harder and harder to get big raises...

So finding a new job that will pay 20% more is probably unlikely...

The question is do you like the people you work with, do you have fun at work?

If yes, try getting other benefits, like going often on paid training/conferences to improve yourself, maybe company paid MBA or my favorite: working from home - for me this and my team is what keeps me from early retirement...

If you don't like it anymore, find another job, but the grass is not always greener on the other side...

</comment><comment><USER13> Universal law of employment: Unless you are a 10x developer, to get a decent raise, you've got to switch companies. They'll squeeze you for every ounce of work otherwise.

</comment><comment><USER14> You have no BATNA, nobody is going to give you "what youre worth" (they literally do exactly that)

</comment><comment><USER3> This is normal. Many employers never offer raises at all. Who cares? The real raise will come when you take the experience you've gained and move on to your next job. What's a few per cent here and there when your next job transition will likely increase your salary by 10-50%?

</comment><comment><USER15> Know the Numbers!

it's hard to find an answer to question 1, as those who know the answer don't want to make it public, but my guess is it's "whatever they feel like" depending on many factors. Those factors can be out of your control or not (budget issues, crappy project where your skills didn't shine, or you preferred taking it more easy because of your life choices)

If you salary is above average and you won't find companies with better salaries, then you're probably one of the highest paid in town, you should feel good about this. But if you know other companies around who pays better, then one course of action is to apply to those in hope of a better salary. If you have friends in those companies, try gathering information about their past year raise and their salaries. Try gathering information about friends in your current company too, but not close co-workers, as they might feel uncomfortable discussing this. Instead, since you're in a big company, ask people in a team far away from you, you don't need the exact number, but at least an approximate that you can use in your talk with your manager. Try to find the policy at your company, if they say somewhere (could be in your offer letter) the yearly raise is between 0 and X%

Regarding question 2: yes you want to make it clear that you want a bigger raise, but you don't want to appear greedy. You can mention cost of living in your town, the raises that your friends in your company got, or it's even better to mention the raises your friends got at the other companies, this will give a cue to your manager that _you know_ you could get a better deal somewhere else. Don't say "I want more money", but instead show that there's a sound reasoning about why you want more money : The cost of housing is going up significantly, you want to start putting money aside for a future down- payment, inflation rate is X%, etc. Since you did a good job you think the You today is a better asset to your company that You last year, because you now have expertise in X, Y, Z, and delivered A, B, C ... , so you'd expect a raise that reflect this, accounting for inflation of course. Assuming you know the policy about raise between 0 and X%, and let's say last year you only got X/3% , you could say that you've made a lot of progress this year, try to make your manager acknowledge your accomplishments, and once he does, say that as an above-average you expect at least X/2% given the annual raise policy is between 0 and X%. Since inflation was pretty strong this year, you'd expect even more to catch up.

Finally, you might find useful advice on how to approach these kind of situation, better written, in the book "Getting to Yes"

</comment><comment><USER16> Find a new job!</comment>


Ask HN: Looking for a coach - <AUTHOR> I am the solo founder of my startup HiringPlus. We developed the technology which helps hiring managers find culturally fit candidates. It matches the company's values with a candidate's personality and helps avoid bad hires.
My team and I are working on this platform from more than a year. We came out of beta 3 months back.
Now I am focusing on finding early customers. Being from an engineering background, sales and marketing have not been easy for me.
I have learned a lot so far and now looking for some help.
Before starting my company, I had a life-coach from TonyRobbins. She was great and helped me overcome my personal issues. I understand how beneficial having the right coach can be. But it is hard to find one.
That's why I am turning to this community. If you know a coach or worked with a coach who produced the result for you, please let me know.
TLDR: Would you refer a business coach who can produce great results?
You can learn more about HiringPlus at https://hiringplus.co <comment><USER2> I'd love to chat, how can I get in touch with you?

<comment><AUTHOR> hey Darren, email me to himanshu(at)hiringplus.co</comment></comment>


Would You Let the I.R.S. Prepare Your Taxes? - <AUTHOR> http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/04/16/technology/personaltech/turbotax-or-irs-as-tax-preparer-intuit-has-a-favorite.html?_r=0 <comment><USER4> Previous discussion:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9380232](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9380232)

<comment><USER5> adding ?_r=0 at the end doesn't suddenly change the content of the article...

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> It's absolutely ridiculous that we can't get pre-filled tax forms here in the US. As the article notes, a large part of the reason for that stems from questionable behavior on the part of Intuit, which has been known to not only engage in lobbying [1] but also astroturfing, creating fake "grassroots" campaigns made up of "concerned citizens".[2] (I guess these "concerned citizens" just _really enjoy_ spending time doing paperwork and buying tax software.)

[1] [http://capitolweekly.net/turbo-tax-maker-intuit-again-is- mir...](http://capitolweekly.net/turbo-tax-maker-intuit-again-is-mired-in- political-turmoil/) (link from the article)

[2] [http://www.propublica.org/article/turbotax-maker-linked- to-g...](http://www.propublica.org/article/turbotax-maker-linked-to- grassroots-campaign-against-free-simple-tax-filing)

<comment><USER7> I used TurboTax this year and it's horribly buggy. I ended up having to print and mail two state returns due to TurboTax bugs. Not using it again.

<comment><USER8> I've used turbotax for years, including this one, with some rather ... interesting ... returns in some years, and have never had a problem.

I've used TurboTax this year and it's frighteningly stable.

Anecdata isn't terribly helpful.

<comment><USER9> I also used Turbotax this year, and like every year at the end when asked how the process could be improved I made a similar, albeit less convincing, argument to FreakyT's. This is my 4th year of telling Turbotax I hate them after using them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> All the arguments against seem to stretch credulity. The IRS already computes your taxes, they are just not allowed to share that with you (thanks to Intuit's lobbying). Instead, you must repeat the computation, and hope that your computations match what the IRS has.

If you don't match, then the IRS will either audit you or send you a proposed correction (along with penalties); i.e. once you fail to match, then the IRS is allowed to show you the correct calculations.

This is an incredibly convoluted system.

<comment><USER11> Seems to be how many Federal forms work: Fill out this form accurately, under penalty of perjury. We already know all this information, but reserve the right to prosecute you if your answers don't match ours. Don't forget to sign.

<comment><USER12> State too -- I remember when I did a defensive driving course in lieu of paying a ticket, you had to get a certified state copy of your driving record ... that the state already has.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I live in Finland, and I have never filed a tax return. The tax office here has used pre-filled annual forms since the mid 1990s, and since 2006 the pre- filled form is automatically accepted if you take no action. For me, the information has always been 100% correct, and should there be an error you can correct it in an online service using two-factor e-banking login or a government-issued ID card with smartchip for authentication.

<comment><USER14> The US tax code is stupidly complex. There are over 500 changes a year made. That is just federal taxes. You are also affected by state, county and city laws. For all practical purposes, it is impossible to do the returns 100% correctly. Legislators use the tax code extensively to achieve things, from social good through corporate welfare and what most would consider outright corruption. Voters in areas may also add to laws with various funding initiatives (eg extra taxes to cover funding for school construction).

Look at sales tax just for California - [http://www.boe.ca.gov/sutax/pam71.htm](http://www.boe.ca.gov/sutax/pam71.htm) \- and that table of quicklinks should frighten you. That is just scratching the surface. For example sales tax for in person transactions is charged based on the address of the store. Unless you buy a car, in which case it is your home address.

Two other factors apply. One is an American mentality that doing minor things against the law isn't _that_ wrong, and being caught is where it becomes real. An example is speeding - it almost seems a contest of wits to not get caught, rather than fixing the limits or realising why they exist. Is it wrong to lie on your tax return about something, where the odds of getting caught are very low, and everyone else is doing it anyway? An example of that is how people call Amazon sales tax free because they are out of state. The supreme court says yes they are sales tax free (to not hinder interstate commerce), but then states charge a "use tax" which happens to be exactly the same as the sales tax. Very few people admitted to their out of state purchases since they were so unlikely to get caught.

The final factor is a distrust of government. They are seen as plodding, corrupt, useless, expensive, political, uncaring and largely pointless. They are very rarely seen as an instrument of voter will. This is what provides the perennial source of jokes - the DMV (department of motor vehicles), the IRS, city hall and all that. Who would trust government to get things right?

So tax returns turn into a contest. What do people think they get away with? Which of the many rules will they obey to the letter? What are their neighbours and others getting away with? Was that really a business lunch? How am I paying more tax than I need to?

Despite their values, neither of the main two political parties do anything to fix this. They are however happy to keep adding to the piles of laws, which makes it more expensive to comply, and increasingly unfair.

I often end up paying fines on my returns. This is not because I am a bad person, and I actually try very hard to get it all correct. It is just cheaper than doing some things the right way, and fairly normal! Some of those fines are also because I don't have a time machine, and I couldn't actually do things correctly without one.

(Note that factors above are generalisations, and don't apply to every last person.)

<comment><USER15> "The final factor is a distrust of government. They are seen as plodding, corrupt, useless, expensive, political, uncaring and largely pointless. They are very rarely seen as an instrument of voter will. This is what provides the perennial source of jokes - the DMV (department of motor vehicles), the IRS, city hall and all that. Who would trust government to get things right?"

This I find to be the absolute dumbest reason of all. The IRS already knows everything about your income that you would be telling them anyway.

<comment><USER14> > The IRS already knows everything about your income that you would be telling > them anyway.

Not even close. For example they don't know how much you paid in state taxes, and which portions of that are also considered okay for fed taxes. Eg in California a portion of your annual vehicle registration fee can be taken against state taxes. Do the feds also allow that?

They don't know what you consider business expenses. They don't know how much of your house you used for business purposes. They don't know where you resided during the year and the tax treatment of the various places you did live. They don't know about your moving expenses.

They don't know about income you received in cash. They don't know about your Amazon purchases. They don't know about your medical expenses. They don't know about your losses.

They don't know about your foreign income or assets.

They don't know about dependents, or how they have changed. Or your marriage, or divorce. Or how you want your married taxes to be treated (there are at least two different ways).

That is just scratching the surface of the tax relevant things - there are a huge amount more. As an individual you couldn't get your tax return 100% correct, and the government certainly can't.

Edit: various institutions and employers are required to file information with the IRS. However this is big picture information - for example how much interest you were paid on your bank account, or what the employer paid you. They do not get individual transaction information, cash withdrawals or similar details.

<comment><USER16> I was under the impression that the IRS has access to all your bank account transactions (or rather, financial institutions are required to disclose that information)?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Could I just call out David Williams, Intuit's Chief Tax Officer, for making statements that range from disingenuous to despicable. I mean, he may coach his kid's little league team and be a wonderful co-worker, but could you imagine having a job that required you to actively lie and make tens of millions of people worse off so that you can make more money?

'And rather than download people's financial data from government sources — which Mr. Williams said might not be very secure — Intuit prefers to connect its systems to banks, employers and other private companies to obtain taxpayers' information, he said.'

David Williams knows perfectly well that every US taxpayer's tax transcript (showing W-2s, 1099s, etc.) are available online at [http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/Get- Transcript](http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/Get-Transcript) . Intuit is using security as a cover for their regulatory capture <[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_capture>](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_capture>) of the US tax paying system.

</comment><comment><USER7> The best way to simplify tax preparation is to simplify the tax code. The percentage of people who save money by itemizing deductions is extremely small, as is the percentage who claim (or are eligible for) any of the more generous deductions.

Doing taxes in the US feels like going through a garbage can of bad social program ideas, bureaucratic waste, etc. Then to make matters worse we get expensive wars...

<comment><USER18> > The best way to simplify tax preparation is to simplify the tax code.

That much I absolutely agree with. A flat tax would require a single tax form the size of a business card.

> The percentage of people who save money by itemizing deductions is extremely > small, as is the percentage who claim (or are eligible for) any of the more > generous deductions.

Not true at all. Anyone who owns a home itemizes to deduct interest. Anyone who pays enough state taxes itemizes because you can deduct state tax payments on your federal taxes.

I do agree that taxes should be drastically simplified, but in the process they would also need to be lowered so that the average person pays the same or less in taxes as they would have with today's high taxes and deductions.

<comment><USER19> A progressive tax would require the same size tax form, even a progressive tax that went negative at the lower incomes.

Flat isn't the simplification -- elimination of the billion deductions is the simplification.

<comment><USER18> Not when you take into account that the tax form needs to include instructions, and any necessary tables.

> Flat isn't the simplification -- elimination of the billion deductions is > the simplification.

If you have deductions, it isn't a flat tax. "Flat" typically implies both rate and lack of deductions.

<comment><USER19> Ok, it would require 30 seconds of 3rd grade level math. That's clearly unacceptable, and we need to instead pursue a solution that pushes wealth upwards. Because simplicity, right? No other agendas involved there? Let's talk about job creators.

<comment><USER18> There are many arguments in favor of a flat tax beyond just simplicity, fairness among them. Also, I wasn't just suggesting a flat tax, I was suggesting a much _lower_ flat tax.

If you took current government revenue from income taxes as a percentage of total personal income and just used that as the flat tax rate, that would indeed be quite unreasonable, mostly because that revenue number is far too high. On the other hand, a flat rate in the 4-5% range might not be unreasonable.

Or, alternatively, a simple formula that would still count as "flat tax":

        tax = flat_rate * max(income - floor, 0)

Where "floor" is a threshold below which you pay no taxes. That would address the set of people for whom even a tiny increase in taxes could make the difference between making ends meet and not.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> How about this: NO

The IRS needs to go away. It is an organization responsible for the execution and enforcement of the enslaving of the American people.

Our tax system has devolved from "let's collectively pay for our expenses" to a system using financial punishment for behavior modification. Freedom my ass.

The other problem is that, through attrition, people have become comfortable with taxing just about anything, even farts:

[http://dailycaller.com/2014/04/11/republicans-warn-of-a- fede...](http://dailycaller.com/2014/04/11/republicans-warn-of-a-federal-tax- on-cow-flatulence/)

Not only do we have to kill off or massively reduce the size and influence of the IRS, we need serious controls on how government spends our money. Government is huge beyond belief and grotesquely inefficient. Of course, the crown jewel of this and what probably brought it home for a lot of people is the ridiculous cost and mess that the Obamacare website became.

How should we pay for running the country? A flat tax is one idea. A consumption tax is another.

I personally think that no government should take more than 20% of your money. In our case this would include state and federal added up. Government needs to be the most frugal, efficient and effective enterprise in a country, not the most wasteful, inefficient and ineffective organization, which is what we have.

<comment><USER21> This is "The United States of America". It was intended as an association of states. Get rid of the creeping direct taxation, and just bill the states. Let each state decide how its share of federal revenue is raised (income tax? sales tax? mineral rights sales? port fees? smart investing? etc).

The IRS should be two guys who work a couple days twice a year. When the Congress & President pass a budget, these two take the bottom line revenue needed, divide by number of congressmen, aggregate by state, and send each Governor a bill (overnight courier); next day they confirm the bills were received. On April 16, they open the IRS mailbox, cash the checks for each state; next day they confirm the funds transferred, and inform the President which states did/didn't pay on time (subject to Executive enforcement). Done.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> My understanding is that they _already do_. That is, I send in my tax documents, and they check the documentation against what they've _already received_ from others. Then upon comparison, they decide, if things match up, I'm OK. If not, they send me a notice that they think I owe more or less than I think I do.

It seems to me an altogether more sensible approach to have them make available the records they have for me, and I can check them, or ask someone to check them, or whatever. I'm tired of the fact that in 2015, I am still waiting until sometime in February to get that one piece of paper about my house mortgage before I can go off and pay someone to do a bunch of mindless redundant (see above) paperwork for me.

I'd much rather my financial planner just pull up my information, and file adjustments on my behalf, etc, and go about my business.

<comment><USER23> > It seems to me an altogether more sensible approach to have them make > available the records they have for me

[http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/Get- Transcript](http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/Get-Transcript)

If the IRS has any documentation on you, it's available on the web. This includes notices, etc. sent out.

<comment><USER10> But not until you've filed the tax return that requires those documents, right?

<comment><USER23> No. If your employer has issued a W2, anyone has issued a 1099 to you (via SSN), or any other documentation has been sent to or from the IRS, it's there.

I used it this year to verify my tax filings.

<comment><USER10> Wow - thank you for the tip! Going to double-check my own details now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> _Groups that call for lower taxes, like Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform, say it is a "conflict of interest" for the government to both collect taxes and calculate how much people owe._

I think there's some logic in this objection, but then again, I don't see these same complaints levied against the other "post-billed" taxes people deal with, like property, vehicle, and so forth.

Really, there's no likeable side in this. The tax prep software people ( _never_ buy Intuit!) have a vested interest in keeping the tax code complicated, and decent portions of the government has a vested interest in same.

The solution to both problems is a massive simplification of the income tax code - too many people opposed to it for that to ever happen, though.

<comment><USER7> > it is a "conflict of interest" for the government to both collect taxes and > calculate how much people owe

Doesn't the government do this anyway? Try claiming that you owe $0 and see how that goes over. The individual taxpayer has already had the money withheld and then submits paperwork after the fact just in case any of the business entities involved failed to submit their required documentation.

<comment><USER24> In about 15 years in the labor force, I've never once had the withholding match up perfectly with the taxes owed. Either not enough is withheld or too much.

Either way, I'm stuck filing the #($&ing paperwork.

<comment><AUTHOR> The withholding is calculated by you and your employer, not the IRS.

<comment><USER7> So how can I request $0 withholding?

<comment><AUTHOR> If you underwithhold several years in a row, you get hit with fines and retroactive interest.

<comment><USER7> I'm aware of that but my point is that most employers would not allow that since the employer is also liable if it under-withheld for a W2 employee.

<comment><USER25> > I'm aware of that but my point is that most employers would not allow that > since the employer is also liable if it under-withheld for a W2 employee.

AFAIK, they aren't liable for under withholding if they withhold correctly according to the W-4 signed by the employee, even if the W-4 claims things (e.g., "exempt" when the employee does not meet the qualifications) that are not accurate.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Nope, for a few reasons.

First, the IRS has already screwed my taxes up with faulty assumptions - <USER2> times over the last decade. Each time it's been a huge pain to correct. I simply don't trust them to get it right.

Second, I don't particularly trust them to notify me when there's something in the tax code that works in my favor. They're not going to file your 83b elections for you. They certainly aren't going to tell you about, say, the special rules for the Qualified Small Business Stock that you've held for five years. However, they'll happily take your overpayments if you don't know about these rules yourself.

Third, I want everyone to be more aware of the taxes they're paying. You're not going to get informed citizens and intelligent voters if the system's set up to hide the financial consequences of their voting decisions. It'd be better for America and American politics if we moved in the opposite direction, and got rid of automatic tax withholding.

<comment><AUTHOR> How do you feel about this quote from the article?

 _"Imagine if your vehicle registration fee was done the same way," Mr. Bankman asked in a recent interview. "Imagine if the state said, 'Go to your car, find your VIN number and then look at this table that has different tax rates to find out how much you owe.' If they did, people would probably need to hire an expert for that too."_

<comment><USER26> Honestly, I'm a little torn.

It sounds like a huge pain, and I wouldn't want to do it. Neither would anyone else.

On the other hand, huge pains like this are how policy gets changed. If it became more obvious to everyone that this was yet another hidden tax, perhaps there'd be more pressure to eliminate it or make it more rational.

<comment><AUTHOR> How far would you take it? Would you support a law that mandated that taxes had to be paid in person, at one central office, with a long line in a hot, crowded room, and also they have crying babies and car alarms? That would be an even bigger pain and lead to even more pressure to eliminate taxes.

<comment><USER26> When someone already says they're torn about an intermediate position, they're not likely to be in favor of one taken to cartoonish extremes.

<comment><AUTHOR> The thing is, though, I find it cartoonish to force people to calculate and file their own income tax. Especially since many of them just pay someone else (a person or a computer program) to do it for them. Which, in a way, is like yet another tax.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> "Why are taxes not easier?"

Because Revenue/Tax collection services in many countries operate on the principle of "guilty until proven innocent", they simply view every individual/company as being guilty by default and it is the job of that entity to prove they are not (hence lack of motivation in pre-filling forms as is suggested in article)

The same line of thinking is also why the tax code is so complicated and seems to always get more complicated, it becomes almost impossible to become tax compliant for average person/company since there are so many caveats and loopholes and exceptions and so on, tho it also leads to employment for armies of accountants, advisors etc and of course the people working for Revenue/Tax entities themselves. Why would the give us simpler tax codes and procedures when it can put them out of job? Reminds me of CIV quote "The bureaucracy is expanding to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy."

</comment><comment><USER28> I'm in the Midwest USA, I work a 9-5 day job (W2) and brought in $45k in side income freelancing (1099) last year, with a few grand in expenses. I own a house (home office deduction, mortgage interest, etc) and have two kids (deductions), trade stocks for fun (dividends, capital gains/losses). I paid my brother $5k as a subcontractor on a project.

Admittedly, as a sole proprietor my taxes are simpler than many business owners' taxes would be, but their considerably more complicated than the average Joe's. My accountant charged me $135 to handle everything for me. He's been doing business with my family for years, but I'm more than happy to pay him and he seems to do a pretty good job of finding me deductions.

Is this uncommon? Are reputable tax accountants that hard to find, or are they really that expensive? I can't think of a reason I'd buy TurboTax or anything else when I can have someone with 30+ years experience taking care of it for me...

<comment><USER29> I would have expected closer to $250 to $300 from a decent accountant for your tax work. $135 is a pretty good price, if we're talking, say, two hours of total billing time.

I think it's very easy to find good tax accountants, it just becomes a pricing matter. I think you're getting a great deal and I'd absolutely stick with your accountant.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> >No other industrialized country asks its citizens to jump through as many hoops to calculate their taxes as ours.

Except for Canada? The same sort of situation exists here. The Canada Revenue Agency enthusiastically supports the private tax preparation companies. It's pretty much the same deal except perhaps a little worse. The private companies will extend you charity here as well, but if you have any amount of income you don't even get online forms to fill out.

Presently in Canada the only way for a citizen to file their own taxes is by filling out paper forms. Ironically the easiest way to get the forms is to download them off the internet from the CRA website. Then you fill them out and mail them.

The really ridiculous thing is that since the CRA already has all the information it doesn't really matter how you fill out the forms. Just get your deductions and withholding on there and you are good. You can put whatever other gibberish on there you want.

I actually file on paper on the principal that I don't want to support a corrupt system. This year I am considering just drawing pictures on the parts that are ignored and putting down a hundred billion jillion dollars as my refund... I strongly suspect that the people made to do the data entry could use a bit of entertainment.

</comment><comment><USER31> The Finnish tax authority switched to prefilled tax forms years ago - I have literally never had to do my taxes unless I have wanted to report some extra deductions. Usually I don't bother. You don't even have to provide receipts for your deductible expenses, just store them for some number of years for the purposes of a potential audit (a mostly hypothetical scenario for a middle class private person.)

</comment><comment><USER32> I let HMRC do it, and they've been good enough to even refund me when I was overpaying. So, yeah, I'd let the IRS do it if I moved back.

</comment><comment><USER33> This is certainly feasible from a technology standpoint. But so is backing up emails, and the IRS doesn't have a very good track record on that comparatively simple task. I'm no fan of filling out taxes each year, but it's reasonable to exercise skepticism when contemplating large US Government IT projects.

</comment><comment><USER34> Another issue, before we even talk about letting the IRS filing for you, is the amount of redundant paper work and mailing.

Entities are required to provide your W2, or 1099, or whatever have you through the mail. They have to provide several copies as well.They still provide a 'send to the IRS with your return' copy, which is not required, but also redundant again by the amount of people electronic filing.

The flow of -> entity printing the documents -> mailing them -> individual then either entering in themselves or having somebody else prepare their taxes -> the information is, for the most part, entered into the computer via plane ole' data entry...by a person -> the return is e-filed to the IRS...who already has an electronic copy of said document...from the Entity that sent it to you...

Let's face it, before we even debate about letting the IRS just do it for us...let's at least get them to streamline the process. The IRS single handily keeps the Post Office in business, not to mention the cost and time/labor expense of the tax payers. (at least we get to deduct tax prep cost...if you can actually itemize..)

Let's get the basic forms first. The IRS should have an easier method of somebody getting the information about them that was sent in from entities electronically. Set up an API, I'm sure the NSA will let them use their server farms... This alone would probably eliminate the need for 80% of the population to ever have to file. All Capital gains will be in, unless the basis was not submitted to the IRS of course.

Now, I don't see a blanket, "The IRS will file your taxes for you" for everyone. Most people who have K1's or Sch C's, etc, will most likely need to make estimated payments. Many of the decisions on what to classify things and best place to 'deduct' them can become an art. But that is not going to apply to most people.

I've probably repeated some stuff in the article, I only skimmed it.

</comment><comment><USER35> Anti-government ideologues don't want taxes to be easy because they want people to complain and hate the government more. Anti-government ideologues are why we can't have a lot of nice things.

</comment><comment><USER36> [Duplicate] (except this is using the mobile subdomain)

Previous discussion here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9380232](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9380232)

Mods, is it possibly to merge these two discussion?

</comment><comment><USER37> Lobbying is how laws get made and unmade in the US. If you want laws changed, you had better have a lot of money or the right connections. Your voice might as well be non-existent if it's not accompanied by a campaign contribution.

</comment><comment><USER38> My dad works for the IRS. Got an SMS from him the other day: "I owe 11k!" Guess working for the IRS is no guarantee of getting your withholdings right.

</comment><comment><USER39> It's funny that that the article lists Intuit as the primary opposition. Every company that does tax preparation and creative loopholing, as well as the people taking advantage of the loopholes is a likely opponent.

</comment><comment><USER40> I would. But I'm sure YC techno-libertarians will find a reason it's a bad idea.

<comment> mycroft-holmes Maybe it's just me but I see a lot more liberal leaning comments on here than I do libertarian.

<comment><USER22> It seems to be pretty even split IMO. It depends on your personal bias - <USER3> you lean in X direction, comments leaning in X direction will seem "reasonable", therefore not trigger your "oh crap this person is a Y" alarm. Since the human brain isn't really wired with an "all is as expected" alarm, it tends to not notice these things.

<comment> mycroft-holmes But wouldn't "reasonable" comments trigger an "oh crap this person is like me" alarm?

<comment><USER41> No, for the same reason that pain is more memorable than pleasure.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Yes

<comment><USER43> 1

<comment><USER44> ^

<comment><USER45> this

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> > Would You Let the I.R.S. Prepare Your Taxes?

No.

Stop with these stupid stop-gap measures. Income taxes are inherently flawed on so many levels, it's absurd. They're difficult to calculate, easy to cheat on, don't tax swaths of people who don't have a traditional income, cause grief every year and untold resources to calculate, verify, audit, etc.

Just stop.

A national sales tax, property tax, or frankly, any other option, would be better by far.

<comment><USER23> > easy to cheat on

> national sales tax

Haha, good luck with that. Sales taxes are substantially easier to cheat than income taxes for most people.

Nationalizing sales taxes just provides more incentive to cheat.

[https://craigslist.org](https://craigslist.org)

<comment><USER47> Sales taxes are also a regressive tax. Low income households and those living paycheck to paycheck end up paying as a proportion of their income far more than high income households, since they consume more relative to the money coming in (and there's no exemption or deduction).

<comment><USER23> I was going to comment this as well.

OR has no sales tax, everyone goes crazy about it, yet they have one of the highest income taxes in the nation.

Even for the poorest, it's very difficult for that to be a good bargain.

<comment><USER48> I moved from a state with no income tax and a sales tax to Oregon. I don't make six figures and I definitely pay more in OR state income tax than I did in sales tax in my previous state.

<comment><USER23> 6-8% of taxable expenditures, by definition, will equal less than the equivalent state income tax.

Even if you spend every dime you make, your expenditure will almost never be completely sales-taxable (in our current system).

The national, tax-everything sales tax doesn't tax idle money. People with money have lots of it and can spend it non-domestically.

<comment><USER25> > 6-8% of taxable expenditures, by definition, will equal less than the > equivalent state income tax.

Not true; _actual_ state income tax isn't its nominal rate on all income (state income tax usually starts with AGI and then has state deductions and credits). So 6-8% on some subset of expenditures may be more, equal, or less than 6-8%on subset of income.

Heck, its not even true without considering that; it would be -- without considering that income tax excludes some income in the same way that sales tax excludes some expenditures -- if expenditures had to be less than income, but its possible to run a deficit as long as your income is sufficient to pay the increasing debt service cost, which (particularly with an increasing income over time) can be an arbitrarily long period of time.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


FIQL: The Feed Item Query Language (2007) - <AUTHOR> https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-nottingham-atompub-fiql-00 <comment><USER2> ... I think this trumps Ejacs for the title of "worst project name ever".

<comment><USER3> This just sounds like fickle, no?

<comment><USER4> > 1\. Introduction

> The Feed Item Query Language (FIQL, pronounced "fickle") is a simple but > flexible, URI-friendly syntax for expressing filters across the entries in a > syndicated feed.

<comment><USER5> Their question had an emphasis on "just", not on "sounds".</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What do you listen to when you code? - <AUTHOR> Individual songs, playlists, artists, all suggestions welcome! <comment><USER2> Generally power metal here - Nightwish, Blind Guardian, Helloween, Gamma Ray, Angra, Edguy, HammerFall, Manowar, Kamelot, older Sonata Arctica, Demons & Wizards, etc.

Sometimes I'll venture into some female-fronted metal bands like Within Temptation or Delain too.

Regular heavy metal also is always fine - Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, some Dio.

Dream Theater is also quite a great progressive metal band, as well as their side project Liquid Tension Experiment.

Some solo guitarists make some great stuff - one of my personal favorites is Kiko Loureiro (Angra, Megadeth).

As far as non-metal artists I'll listen to while coding, one of my favorites is Gary Moore - he was an extraordinarily prolific artist, one of the most genre spanning more mainstream artists I listen to. I also like listening to Kate Bush as well.

I've listened to music of a lot of different genres too outside those whose artists I have listed - this might not work for everyone though. If I'm listening to something I like, I'm happy and generally avoid being distracted.

<comment><USER3> Wes? ;)

Also, ditto - Prog and power metal seems to kickstart my brain and has often helped me out of nonproductive slumps.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Digitally Imported has a very wide range of, well, digital music.

They have some free ad supported streams but the annual cost of ad-free $70 is totally worth it in my opinion.

My current favorite channels are Chillstep, Liquid DnB, Nu Disco, Chill & Tropical House. Various levels of repetitive bass to keep your leg and fingers twitching, and differing tempos to either raise or lower your heart rate, depending on what you need in the moment.

Web Browser Flash or mobile apps. [http://www.di.fm](http://www.di.fm)

<comment><USER5> I haven't been on di since the early 2000's. Glad to see it's still around.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I like synthwave stuff when I'm programming.

favorites:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DY1s9SmrQRE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DY1s9SmrQRE)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3NoYyNKSXQ&t=1672s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3NoYyNKSXQ&t=1672s)

</comment><comment><USER7> I mostly listen to these sets:

[https://musicforprogramming.net/](https://musicforprogramming.net/)

I also like these SomaFM stations:

[https://somafm.com/deepspaceone/](https://somafm.com/deepspaceone/)

[https://somafm.com/spacestation/](https://somafm.com/spacestation/)

[https://somafm.com/sf1033/](https://somafm.com/sf1033/)

</comment><comment><USER8> I don't listen to anything when coding. I need the silence, and deep thought. However, when I'm doing trivial things, I listen to classical music. Usually "Essential Classical", or something similar, on Google Music.

</comment><comment><USER9> It varies. Sometimes I listen to my "stock" music - hard rock and heavy metal of all varieties, with a special focus on 80's era glam metal, speed metal, and thrash metal.

Other times it's various forms of electronic music. House, trance, europop, Hi-NRG, synthwave/darkwave, etc.

And then sometimes I go with classical music. Bach, Vivaldi, Verdi, Wagner, Strauss, Orff, etc.

As far as specifics go, here's some stuff I've listened to lately:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8OELzmpgZo&list=PL7F37BB1A6...](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8OELzmpgZo&list=PL7F37BB1A67E0238D)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9oTQzwXYXk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9oTQzwXYXk)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hd8Or1RrYs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hd8Or1RrYs)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4oZZhpMXP4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4oZZhpMXP4)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NyfL9LC1DC4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NyfL9LC1DC4)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajF2NOuYkjk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajF2NOuYkjk)

[https://youtu.be/-7Q61fH-03E](https://youtu.be/-7Q61fH-03E)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGMJ2b-3eCk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGMJ2b-3eCk)

One other thing I'll sometimes do is put on a movie in the background, with the volume turned down fairly low... just enough that I hear some babble and noise, but not enough that I get caught up in what's going on. This only works if I use a movie I've seen / heard many times, so I already know what's happening and won't get drawn into the story. So, something like The Matrix, Antitrust, Tron:Legacy, Hackers, Sneakers, The Social Network, etc.

</comment><comment><USER10> Rarely Heard Ragas by Vilayat Khan (sitar) is very good for listening to while working, IMO. Similarly other mild melodies on stringed instruments. Relaxes you while you work.

[https://jugad2.blogspot.com/2013/10/music-video-sitar- vilaya...](https://jugad2.blogspot.com/2013/10/music-video-sitar-vilayat-khan- rarely.html)

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vilayat_Khan](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vilayat_Khan)

Edit(s):

Vivaldi's Four Seasons is another good one for this.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonio_Vivaldi](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonio_Vivaldi)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Four_Seasons_(Vivaldi)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Four_Seasons_\(Vivaldi\))

Barclay James Harvest. The story of how they got their name is interesting :)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barclay_James_Harvest](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barclay_James_Harvest)

</comment><comment><USER11> I generally listen to heavy metal, classic and hard rock that tends a bit towards prog with long sections and a bit of classical, epic feel to them. Something like Dio-era Rainbow, Led Zeppelin and Iron Maiden.

A few favorites:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6CjO0H2j0s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6CjO0H2j0s)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYrW3yONR44](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYrW3yONR44)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVid_fLzN5g](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVid_fLzN5g)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDwotNLyz10](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDwotNLyz10)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J51LPlP-s9o](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J51LPlP-s9o)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTqv59JXMUk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTqv59JXMUk)

</comment><comment><USER12> I love this Spotify list: [https://open.spotify.com/user/ruhin94/playlist/0bG1EMQkukEeO...](https://open.spotify.com/user/ruhin94/playlist/0bG1EMQkukEeO7vvcQQQYU)

Over 22 hours of powerful movie, game soundtracks.

Gets updated with new songs all the time.

</comment><comment><USER13> Deep house, or other kinds of repetitive electronic music. Even though I'm usually a rock/jazz person, this music is perfect some times: very chill parties, dancing alone but surrounded by people, programming. Sometimes commuting.

It's relaxing, rather dronic but with enough variation to not be boring.

</comment><comment><USER14> Four Tet, Burial, Aphex Twin, µ-Ziq, etc.

<comment><USER15> Nice choices! Boards of Canada too?

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Pinback has recently helped me write a ton of code.

Tool, A Perfect Circle, Ashes Divide for a mellow, metal mood.

Vitamin String Quartet when I want something familiar, but classical in taste

Nicklecreek, Chris Thile, Old Crow Medicine Show, Punch Brothers for a folk fix.

Kid Ory when a need a New Orleans Jazz pick-me-up

</comment><comment><USER17> Chill stuff/Wave music

[https://soundcloud.com/dvrksea/youre-in-my- life](https://soundcloud.com/dvrksea/youre-in-my-life)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4w7vgHnrYA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4w7vgHnrYA)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1yBhxn7H5o](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1yBhxn7H5o)

Can't listen if I'm venturing into new territory; learning requires quiet. Otherwise it's Wave music. eg wave, vaporwave, synthwave, witch house, future funk, future beats etc

</comment><comment><USER18> Music with minimal words (which I find distracting) but often with vocals. Usually an album at a time e.g.,

Ibiza chill sessions (annual albums) Melody AM The altogether Little dragon (NPR remix)

a lot of electric guitar - Steve Vai, joe satriani

</comment><comment><USER19> Mostly various forms of jazz--lately I've been on a roll with Pharaoh Sanders and Sun Ra. But the key thing is I find it distracting to hear voices while I'm trying to work. So mostly music with no vocals.

<comment><USER15> I feel the same way about vocals but I also try to avoid jazz with horn solos, so I stick to piano jazz like Hiromi, Ahmad Jamal, or Chick Corea.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Autechre. Monolake. Aphex Twin. Boards of Canada. Spahn Ranch. Tycho. μ-Ziq. Loscil. Plaid. Kangding Ray. Emptyset. Shackleton. The Black Dog.

Also an assortment of Psy-Trance, Coldwave, and Industrial generes.

</comment><comment><USER21> Anything in a language that I don't personally know. I find that the foreign language lyrics just pass through my brain freely whereas an English or Spanish song will sometimes grab my attentions because my brain is picking up the words. So lately it's been a lot of J-Pop and K-Pop. I used to listen to a bunch of German industrial music, but I've recently been learning German and so that's starting to interfere.

</comment><comment><USER22> A little bit of everything...but when I really need to be productive I always put on the 'Tragic Boogie' album by The Life and Times.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7mReSQ- CZs&list=PLFNYv0PFOF...](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7mReSQ- CZs&list=PLFNYv0PFOFQqPGhdIJGxryfkrO04l3qk9)

It's been my go-to for 7 or 8 years now. Something about it just triggers the best of my skills to come out.

<comment><USER23> When I access that playlist, it shows the video is not available.

<comment><USER22> Interesting, it still loads when I try.

It's on bandcamp as well, though: [https://thelifeandtimes.bandcamp.com/album/tragic- boogie](https://thelifeandtimes.bandcamp.com/album/tragic-boogie)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Depends on what I'm coding.

Sometimes I will put on old episodes of Retronauts ([https://retronauts.com](https://retronauts.com)). Otherwise I will usually listen to OCRemix Radio / Rainwave ([https://rainwave.cc](https://rainwave.cc)), a SiriusXM station, or an album I'm familiar with.

</comment><comment><USER25> I have this weird memory of Tom Hudson, former Atari developer who I think ended up at Autocad, listening to the Rambo II soundtrack while developing. Not sure why this memory stuck. [http://www.atarimagazines.com/startv3n3/programunderpres.htm...](http://www.atarimagazines.com/startv3n3/programunderpres.html)

</comment><comment><USER26> Chicago's 911. [http://youarelistening.to/chicago](http://youarelistening.to/chicago) For some reason and in my timezone difference to Chicago it puts my brain into coding mode, sometimes hours. I doubt anybody else around me would enjoy that.

</comment><comment><USER27> [http://musicforprogramming.net/](http://musicforprogramming.net/)

[https://soundcloud.com/hex-ane/sets/sojourn-ep](https://soundcloud.com/hex- ane/sets/sojourn-ep)

</comment><comment><USER28> It used to have more but there is still a lot of choice. [http://mikesradioworld.com/](http://mikesradioworld.com/) Cycle through BBC and Irish stations. Saving regular ones in Rhythmbox or VLC on my phone.

</comment><comment><USER29> When I want to be super productive I'm listening to The Lord of The Rings Soundtrack. It feels like I'm doing some epic coding things. Just imagine when you are doing git push while there is Themes Of The Rohirrim playing.

</comment><comment><USER30> Daft Punk - Tron Legacy Reconfigured

Spotify Link: [https://open.spotify.com/album/6yT9Q73eTMfx1aDWJiCVIt](https://open.spotify.com/album/6yT9Q73eTMfx1aDWJiCVIt)

Never fails to get me in the mood.

Edit: Add link to album

</comment><comment><USER31> Anamanaguchi or "Pogo" ([https://www.youtube.com/user/Fagottron/](https://www.youtube.com/user/Fagottron/)) station on Pandora

</comment><comment><USER32> Grateful Dead shows on the Internet Archive.

They're free. They're long so you don't need to be interrupted to change a track. The really spacey jams put you in a creative mindspace.

Plus, one of the songwriters founded the EFF!

</comment><comment><USER33> An orchestra of fellow developer fingers dancing on mechanical keyboards!

</comment><comment><USER34> This one works really well for me, when working (discovered thanks to HN !): [https://www.brain.fm](https://www.brain.fm)

<comment><USER35> Seconded. Love it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> Classical chamber music, white noise, YouTube videos of people playing video games, the customer service people on the phone sitting 5 feet away from me.

</comment><comment><USER37> Muchado in the Classic Rock and Techno/Trance genres, and 80s music, but sometimes outside of it too.

From Moby, Pink Floyd, Lindsey Stirling, Disturbed, and M83 are common.

</comment><comment><USER38> Podcasts in the morning and [http://www.di.fm/](http://www.di.fm/) in the afternoon.

</comment><comment><USER39> cat /dev/urandom | sox -traw -r44100 -b16 -e unsigned-integer - -tcoreaudio synth pinknoise band -n 1400 200 tremolo 40 .1 gain 8

<comment><USER40> I wanted to check it out. Installed sox on Ubuntu 17.04 and it's not working

        sox FAIL formats: no handler for given file type `coreaudio'

<comment><USER41> You need to replace coreaudio with pulseaudio, try this instead:

        cat /dev/urandom | sox -traw -r44100 -b16 -e unsigned-integer - -tpulseaudio synth pinknoise band -n 1400 200 tremolo 40 .1 gain 8

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Anything without lyrics. Classical music is my normal target, but some of Reznor's electronic soundtracks for movies works well too.

</comment><comment><USER43> Any sound my colleagues make.

</comment><comment><USER5> Techno and deep house are my go tos. Generally, listening via soundcloud.

</comment><comment><USER44> Sports Radio - you have to know everything about your favorite teams :-)

</comment><comment><USER45> Songs similar to the soundtrack from RWBY

</comment><comment><USER46> My inner voice.

</comment><comment><USER47> Hans zimmer instrumental.

</comment><comment><USER48> Tangerine Dream, Vangelis</comment>


AdGuard DNS - <AUTHOR> https://adguard.com/en/adguard-dns/overview.html <comment><AUTHOR> I just came across this and started using it for the DNS servers for my IKEv2 VPN (see [https://github.com/jawj/IKEv2-setup](https://github.com/jawj/IKEv2-setup)). Experience so far has been excellent — especially the speed of web browsing on my iPhone).

</comment><comment><USER2> Looks like a good alternative to my ever growing /etc/hosts file that points every ad server I find objectionable to localhost.</comment>


Automating Hate - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@erin_gallagher/automating-hate-ba9c09f0a5b4 <comment><USER2> Yeah, I noticed that most Twitter trolls are still bots. Their quest to ban automated accounts didn't really work out until now.

For example when you watch tweets by Greta Thunberg most climate denial responses and hateful comments are automated.

Even when I told legit users not to feed those trolls they would respond by context-free climate change denial claims.</comment>


Google's Dart doesn't support deserialising JSON (or anything) into Dart Types - <AUTHOR> https://groups.google.com/a/dartlang.org/forum/#!topic/misc/0pv-Uaq8FGI

<comment><USER2> This seems like a non-issue to me. Serialization isn't built into the core libraries, but there are a number of 3rd party libraries that will serialize from various data formats. Dart has mirrors (reflection) which allows any kind of population of Dart types from other data types.

<comment><AUTHOR> Did you read about any of the suggested options? They all basically suck; requiring tons of boilerplate; are not-static formats (making it difficult to implement "the other side"); poor performance; and mostly implemented by third parties so they'll likely be broken or abandoned in 6 months.

Doesn't it seem strange that a Google-designed language for the future of the web (that's supposed to make development faster and easier) doesn't handle this (basic) requirement easily?

<comment><USER3> I think it would be respectful if you mentioned that you are the starter of the thread on the mailing list in the first place...

<comment><AUTHOR> Apologies; it's been so long since I signed up, I didn't realise my username was quite so cryptic. The thread is indeed mine, and I posted it here in the hope that it might be seen by someone on the Dart Team, as there seems to have been no response from Google on this hole :(

<comment><USER3> I can assure you that the Dart team reads the mailing list and has almost certainly seen your thread there. I appreciate (and can see) that you honestly want to help Dart succeed, but the title of this thread along with the tone of your comments in the mailing list thread I find to be filled with hyperbole. I don't think calling out the team publicly with a misleading title was the best way to go about helping the language.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm sorry if it sounds like I'm being a dick; but I'm incredibly frustrated to have poured so much effort into trying to make Dart a viable option for a rewrite where I work (I've even been working on a Visual Studio extension since all the devs here are primitively .NET devs).

To find something so fundamental missing with no reasonable solution (and no information from the Dart team) is frustrating; it's not going to make selling Dart to my colleagues any easier.

<comment><USER4> I'm kind of interested why you considered Dart in the first place.

Google has such a poor track record in language design, that when I was looking for a compile-to-JavaScript language I didn't even consider Dart.

<comment><AUTHOR> I wrote a blog post some time ago:

[http://blog.dantup.com/2014/05/web-development-sucks-and- its...](http://blog.dantup.com/2014/05/web-development-sucks-and-its-not- getting-any-better/)

And while responding to comments, I read a little more about Dart and it started to look quite appealing. I spend too much of my day maintaining and debugging legacy JavaScript written years ago in sub-optimal ways.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Justin Fagnani's response hits it head on. It makes no sense to deserialize schema-less JSON into objects. How is the compiler to know what classes you want it to use? Even if you just want classes with no methods, the deserializer still needs to know what fields you expect. (Otherwise you have no guarantee what fields the object you're returned has, which is pretty useless!)

Even more, what if you really want a JSON object to be deserialized as a key- value map, not an object? (Those support different functionality!) The compiler has no way of knowing this.

Either you need to provide a schema, in which case it's easy to make a library to deserialize objects, or you're asking for something ill-defined.

<comment><AUTHOR> The class you're deserialising into is the Schema; exactly like C# manages to do it:

var myPerson = deserialise<Person>(json);

If you want a map, that's already supported; but you'll lose all the "type- safety" that Dart brings!

<comment><USER6> This may be easier in C# than in Dart because in C#, you have type declarations for all the members. In Dart, type declarations are optional. (And, IIRC, not supposed to change the behavior of the program, except for type-checks performed while running in "development" mode; even these are disabled in "production".)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I think many people are satisfied with the alternatives presented in that thread. A very large percentage will probably even be happy with the serialization to Lists and Maps - because that is what JavaScript already does! I understand that you have your preferences, and you are entitled to have those. In my opinion, you are not entitled to:

\- Present your complaints as though Dart is missing basic functionality (not in the presence of the presented alternatives). It just misses _your specific_ desired functionality!

\- Assume your use case is representative for a significant amount of other developers.

\- Extend your entitlement to the HN front page.

C# JSON support appears to be awesome, and you are very free to make a Dart library that does exactly that. You are also free to request it to be merged into the core Dart libraries [1]. You are not free, in my opinion, to drag out this complaint so much.

As a reference, here's a list of other typed languages that don't support JSON deserialization-to-classes in their core libraries:

\- Java (Scala, Groovy, Xtend, etc...)

\- GWT Java

\- Kotlin (both on JVM _and_ in browser)

\- Ceylon

\- C++

\- OCaml

\- Swift

\- ...

Seeing those languages are often used to consume web services, it seems Dart is in good company. There's probably a good reason why this stuff is relegated to third party libraries. I'd speculate that 1) accomplishing this is messy and complex in the context of type safety and 2) the problem you are complaining about simply isn't as big as you think it is.

[1]: [https://code.google.com/p/dart/wiki/Contributing](https://code.google.com/p/dart/wiki/Contributing)

<comment><USER8> The moto of Dart is to make the life easier for developers.

I think that moto doesn't fit Dart at all, I use Dart and I have to make some workarounds that I just shouldn't be doing, but I have to because the language doesn't have the functionality that other languajes already have. The problem I see is that the Dart language developers never put them self in the shoes of the developer using their languaje.

In this case, I would be easy for them to add JSON serialization to objects, you know, but they didn't, why? polictics, apathy, whatever, but not technical problems.

So, my self, had to adapt to programming in Dart, so I every class must have a toJSON and fromJSON methods where I manually put the values to a map and then I use convert.JSON. But, I now I gave up using classes and now I just use Maps, just to write less code and is already the type Dart suppor for JSON serialization.

<comment><USER9> > The moto of Dart is to make the life easier for developers.

The word your looking for is "motto".

> I think that moto doesn't fit Dart at all, I use Dart and I have to make > some workarounds that I just shouldn't be doing, but I have to because the > language doesn't have the functionality that other languajes already have.

Newer languages that are comparatively young are usually going to have a less complete ecosystem and its a tradeoff between this and the unique features/approach they offer initially as the ecosystem matures.

> In this case, I would be easy for them to add JSON serialization to objects, > you know, but they didn't, why?

Perhaps because they would have had to _not_ do something else to get Dart released on the same timeline to do it. Lots of things are easy considered in isolation, but there are always opportunity costs, especially if you try to do _every_ easy thing before you release anything.

<comment><USER8> Are you part of the Dart team?

<comment><USER9> No.

<comment><USER8> Then I get the impression you are defending Dart just by inertia and not because you understand the problem, it is very common to see that in fanboys.

<comment><USER9> > Then I get the impression you are defending Dart just by inertia and not > because you understand the problem

I understand the complaint being made. And I explicitly note that there is a real trade-off. OTOH, I also recognize that there are real reasons why new languages don't spring into existence with complete language-native ecosystems on par with the most mature ecosystems in existence.

> it is very common to see that in fanboys.

I'm hardly a Dart fanboy. I think its a nice language that I'd rather work with than, say, JavaScript, and I like that someone is actually interested in challenging the assumption that JavaScript must be the one true language of the web, even if only as the common compilation target. But I don't have a real need for it, and its probably not even in the top 10 languages I'd use right now for a real project (though not having built-in JSON deserialization to user-defined classes isn't among the reasons why. Writing a converter to a custom type from the things it _does_ deserialize JavaScript into isn't particularly challenging.)

<comment><USER8> Then the fact you don't face the same problem that we do, doesn't mean that the problem doesn't exists.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> It seems to me the author should think twice about rewriting an entire code base in a new language. This almost always leads to disaster, and often doesnt give you a lot of value.

Also he is pointing out, that he doesnt want to use 3rd party libraries. I worked with people who said that before... This breaks the whole idea of writing software by standing on the shoulders of giants. When you write an app, you almost ALWAYS use libraries (and they are not written by you). Writing a complete app just with the core language tools seems like total nonsense to me.. Why woudnt you use a library that solves the job for you?

You should off course try to prevent entangling dependency of a lib into your code base. But thats a basic rule of software engineering.

B.t.w, with testing, you can mock away those libraries and still have nice unit tests.

<comment><AUTHOR> There are lots of details about what we're rewriting any why that aren't really relevant to this discussion.

I'm (we're) not against 3rd party libraries; but we'd like to minimise our use of them because we're constantly bitten by poor libraries introducing breaking changes or being abandoned. I'm sure anyone that has worked on a huge codebase over a long period of time has been bitten in the same way. We certainly don't want to rely on 3rd party libraries for something so fundamental (and the absence of it from the Dart Team only makes us more concerned).

<comment><USER11> > poor libraries introducing breaking changes

Don't update unless you have to?

> being abandoned

How is abandoned 3rd party code any worse than code you wrote yourself? In one instance you won't get any updates unless you write them yourself, in the other...

3rd party code is almost always a win - at best you get free code, at the very worst you get to look at some code that you can learn something from.

<comment><AUTHOR> > Don't update unless you have to?

We just starting hitting a bug in NHibernate where objects are GC'd that shouldn't, and it crashes. It was fixed in a newer version, so we updated. This _minor update_ changed the way a bunch of queries work (optimisations that fail when a certain feature is used), and we've had to roll back. We either have Bug A or Bug B.

> How is abandoned 3rd party code any worse than code you wrote yourself?

I understand code I wrote myself and can easily fix bugs. The lsat thing I want to do when I find a bug in a 3rd party library is spend weeks debugging their code because it's been abandoned. In many cases it's a false economy.

> 3rd party code is almost always a win

I don't think you've worked on enough codebases you didn't write that are years old and had hundreds of dependencies pulled in without any thought; especially in something with no sound type-system like JS :O(

Try upgrading jQuery when you've got 150 jQuery plugins that have been abandoned and/or don't work in the new version of IE :-/

<comment><USER11> > We either have Bug A or Bug B

Can you cherry-pick just the fix you want? I'll admit this depends how intertwingled the fixes are...

> I understand code I wrote myself and can easily fix bugs.

I assumed you were in a team - which would level things out a bit even if you have pretty consistent coding standards. Yes - in a one man team the cost/benefit calculation might change.

> I don't think you've worked on enough codebases you didn't write that are > years old and had hundreds of dependencies pulled in without any thought; > especially in something with no sound type-system like JS :O(

Maybe this is the key to our different perspectives. I use lots of 3rd party code but it has to pass the smell test. I'm mainly talking about the Python ecosystem and I've probably learnt how to spot trouble and run away. My heuristics are based on code location:

(-5 if it's on Sourceforge or Launchpad, -3 if it's on Google code, -1 if it's on Bitbucket ;-)

and then stuff like documentation, number of forks and recency of commits - plus just the vibe I get skimming the code...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> One thing Haxe does well here is provide structural typing, effectively letting you declare the result of a deserialization process in type form.

This isn't perfect... you still need to know in advance what kinds of object structures are possible, but generally this isn't too much to ask (e.g. relying on a server api to provide consistent records).

The next catch is that you can't treat these structural type results like typical classes. E.g., you can't have methods, getter/setter logic, etc. However, you can attach relevant methods with a special mixin directive (that does not alter the runtime object).

In this way, I have a pretty good way of providing a robust description of server responses in terms of type information, and a good way of loosely binding these responses to relevant methods.

<comment><USER12> quick sketch: [http://try.haxe.org/#db206](http://try.haxe.org/#db206)

I can't show the "using" method directly here since the two classes need to be in separate files... but I'm giving an example of what it would look like.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I'm not familiar with Dart, but it seems like since it has object(map)/list literal syntax similar to Javascript, deserializing a simple object (no methods) from a string of characters would be trivial. JSON really is a Javascript killer feature imo.

<comment><AUTHOR> It does support deserialising into a _map_ , but not a class. One of the selling points of Dart is classes; which can give code-completion, static analysis, etc.. This is all lost if you use maps instead of classes.

<comment><USER14> The top comment as well as the answer in the thread explains why.

<comment><AUTHOR> Not really; that comment is incorrect. For example, in C# there's a JavaScriptSerializer.Deserialize<T>(string) method that does just this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> When I was a kid you used to serialize to JSON.

</comment><comment><USER16> The stupidity of the question is causing me to have neural pathway executions that are akin to an electoral storm.

Actually thinking you could rewrite 1mil loc and end up with something useful is fallacy enough but choosing an experimental language and then complaining about it?

<comment><AUTHOR> Many products are > 1m LoC. I never said those 1m LoC are in one file (or even one repository).

<comment><USER16> 1m LoC are in one file (or even one repository).

And so your goal is to rewrite them? What is the point? What about the current codebase has business requirements that need it to be rewritten?

<comment><AUTHOR> The reason for a rewrite is beyond the scope of Dart supporting sane serialisation. There are many reasons; but here is not an appropriate place to detail them.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Is slack down for anyone else? - <AUTHOR> I can't access any of my teams via the native app or the web app. As of now, https://status.slack.com reports all good and so does https://downdetector.com/status/slack/ <comment><AUTHOR> Never mind, I think it was router issues, not sure why my router crapped out and couldn't handle Slack or several other sites.</comment>


Comcast Internet Dies from New England to DC:  Google DNS to the rescue - <AUTHOR> http://www.baltimoresun.com/business/technology/bs-md-comcast-20101128,0,6934305.story

<comment><AUTHOR> <https://brokencomcastinternet.wordpress.com/></comment>