Apparently decreased to approximately 667,000

[PATAX]

In 2007, apparently there were an estimated 900,000 to 1,200,000 tax return preparers, therefore the average of this estimate is approximately 1,050,000. In 2025, apparently there are an estimated 667,000 tax return preparers. Therefore an apparent estimated decrease of 36.47%.

[Just-Lisa-Now-]

I think a big chunk bailed when the 1040 was redesigned in 2018, nothing more current than 2007 to compare to?

[IRonMaN]

I believe Jim picked up all of those clients from the 36.47% of preparers that exited stage left. As of 1/31 I believe he had 62.37% of those 36.47% returns done. 😲

[PATAX]

@Just-Lisa-Now- Yea I do not think the "postcard return" was quite helpful.

[PATAX]

@IRonMaN 😂😂😂

[BobKamman]

I hadn't had my morning coffee yet so at first I read that as "deceased."  

Which might be the case, anyway.  

[PATAX]

I noticed over the years, less and less people each year at tax seminars, so I think the number has been decreasing each year. I think some left when there were proposed non-credentialed tax preparer regulations.

[rbynaker]

It'll all be fine.  AI is going to take over.  Nobody needs tax accountants anymore. 🙂

Pick your poison.  I know folks who retired when ACA was passed and added a bunch of tax forms (Add'l Medicare, NIIT, PTC).  More folks retired when TCJA "simplified" everything . . . well, as long as you didn't have to deal with QBI.  Then the forms were "simplified" to fit on a postcard (with 6 pages of brand new schedules 1-6 attached to said postcard).  Now they've "simplified" things by eliminating half of those schedules, and making the remaining schedules two pages each.

I don't know what's coming next, but I'll probably be on the bus with 200,000 other retiring preparers.

Rick

[BobKamman]

Part of the problem is that tax season has been compressed from 14 weeks to 8 weeks. When brokers don't issue 1099s until February 15 (often, corrected by March 15) there is very little work in January and only easy stuff in early February.  For generations, IRS has indoctrinated people into meeting the April 15 deadline.  Avoiding extensions is irrational, for many taxpayers, but old habits die hard.  

Reduce the filing window by 40% and you reduce the income and profit by that much also.  And then half the country has to worry about snowstorms while trying to "make hay while the sun shines."  Watch your step, you have painted yourself into a corner.  

[IRonMaN]

"I noticed over the years, less and less people each year at tax seminars"

You go to those things in person?  I haven't attended any CPE in person since COVID.  That is the one positive thing that came out of COVID.  The closest CPE we could attend was a little over an hour away, with most of it 3.5 hours away.  We now save on travel time and travel costs by being able to do those things remotely.

The CPA profession hasn't done much to help the cause in providing bodies to prepare tax returns or perform audits.  The brain trusts thought that nobody could possibly do this job with a mere four years of education.  There was the big push from state societies to have their states add a year to education requirements.  So somebody wants to sit in a college classroom for 5 years to have the pleasure of doing this job?  So now, after the number of new accountants sprouting up is shrinking, they are rethinking that wonderful idea and trying to back track after the damage was done.  In retrospect, I should have stuck with the profession that I wanted as a young kid - game warden.  Although I think it would be tough for me to arrest folks for exceeding their legal bag limit of road runners.

[TaxGuyBill]

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@IRonMaN wrote:

The brain trusts thought that nobody could possibly do this job with a mere four years of education.  There was the big push from state societies to have their states add a year to education requirements.

---

In my opinion, they should have SUBTRACTED a year rather than add a year.

A couple of years ago I was looking at the Accounting Program at a nearby university.  I think it contained less than 2.5 years of accounting and semi-useful courses (computer classes, business, etc.).  The other 2.5 years were electives and junk.  Do I really need to learn about European history and take art-ceramics class to become a CPA? 

[PATAX]

@IRonMaN yeah you are right before covid there were a lot of seminars. Most of those annual seminars have not come back and were replaced by webinars.

[PATAX]

@rcooley25 please come back so the number can increase to 667,001. We miss you Brother Cooley.

[rcooley25]

I cannot tell you how much I have missed chatting with all of you since retiring but I do not know how since I am not  use Intuit tax programs  now.

[PATAX]

@rcooley25 Just save this email and do not delete it. Then all you have to do is open it up in your email, and hit the pro series tax discussion link. Or you can hit the name of the post link and then go to the top of the post and hit the pro series tax discussion link. if you want to start a post just hit the ask a question link. 

[IRonMaN]

@rcooley25  - your Fireball supply should be safe for awhile.  I hear Canada is telling  Americans to keep their booze, they will drink their own, in retaliation for the new tariffs.

[abctax55]

"....since I am not  use Intuit tax programs  now"

Snort, that doesn't stop the rest of the world/DIYers from posting here.   Altho, I do think the majority of them are Turdohhhhh Tax users and get sent here via 'that' Intuit software.

Glad you found us, even after retiring.  But why do you still want to mess around with this stuff - enjoy retirement !

[TaxGuyBill]

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@rcooley25 wrote:

I cannot tell you how much I have missed chatting with all of you since retiring but I do not know how since I am not  use Intuit tax programs  now.

---

https://accountants.intuit.com/community/

[abctax55]

@TaxGuyBill 

 MY  *favorite* class in college when, working on my accounting degree was music appreciation.  The instructor made us perform something for one test.  I picked playing 'We three kings of Orient Are' on the piano- mainly because my cousin could teach it to me & he said (with my very small hands) it was the best song to try.  

I typify the 'can't carry a tune in a bucket' person.  I got a D on the test.  To this day, I don't understand the connection between performing and appreciating.

[Taxprohere]

I think a good number who frequent this forum remember the godawful 1040-PC that the IRS tried to push, a gibberish of just the line # and amounts and (during my days at HR Block) trying to explain this was the official tax return!  I believe it lasted just a month or so? 

[rcooley25]

What I have earned over the years any time they say they are going to simplyfi things start saying your prayers because things always get worse.

[The_AntiTax_Man]

@PATAX   Could it be due to self-prep using Turbo tax?

I see the IRS FREE FILE got axed by Elon.  He must be an Intuit investor?

[The_AntiTax_Man]

@Just-Lisa-Now-  I agree with you.  The complexity added in 2018 was a major factor in tax preparer retirements.

[The_AntiTax_Man]

@IRonMaN   Yes, Jim took over Ohio.  Is there a Jim in the other 49 states?  What tax software are they using?

[The_AntiTax_Man]

@BobKamman  The compression of the tax season has led to more extensions.  Remember the first extension [August 15th] and the second extension [October 15th] morphed into now only one [October 15th] extension?  

[The_AntiTax_Man]

@rbynaker  LOL, AI will lose it's sanity trying to make sense of our illogical tax code.  You got room on that retirement bus for one more passenger?

[The_AntiTax_Man]

@TaxGuyBill  When interfacing with certain clients on occasion I have actually employed the Psych and Soc gen education that I was forced to attain at the U.  The things that I learned turned out to be useful for me and turned into profitable billable hours.  Also, certain other gen ed classes have come in useful when playing Trivial Persuit.