Taxpayers fear math mistakes and not having enough money

Making a mathematical mistake and not having enough money are the biggest Tax Day fears of taxpayers, according to a new survey.

Both of those fears were cited by 30 percent of the taxpayers polled by the consumer finance site WalletHub, edging out identity theft (21 percent) and getting audited (19 percent).

WalletHub’s 2020 Taxpayer Survey found that 37 percent of the taxpayers polled said they would move to a different country for a tax-free future, 26 percent would get an “IRS” tattoo and 19 percent would stop talking for six months.

The survey also showed that 34 percent of the respondents believe charities would make the best use of their tax dollars, nearly two and a half times the percentage of people that trust the federal government the most with their taxes.

“There are a variety of reasons why roughly 222 million Americans think the government does not spend their tax dollars wisely,” said WalletHub CEO Odysseas Papadimitriou in a statement. “We feel the pain of this big outlay of hard-earned money like a punch in the gut. Not to mention, every election season, there’s a lot of talk about waste, fraud and abuse costing the country billions. You really can’t blame people for feeling like their money might not be in the right hands after hearing that refrain over and over.”

WalletHub also issues research on states with the highest and lowest tax rates. The lowest tax rate is in Alaska, while the highest is in Illinois, according to the company.

The site found little difference among Democratic and Republican-led states. Overall, the average red-state tax rate is 10.67 percent, just under the average blue-state rate of 10.93 percent. The site also identified other areas of agreement between Democrats and Republicans, even in a highly polarized election year environment shortly after an impeachment.

Democrat and Republican respondents agreed that rich people do not pay their fair share in taxes, and that poor and middle-class people do pay their fair share in taxes. Both agreed that their tax rates are too high.

However, the survey also found some areas of disagreement. Most of the Democrat respondents said corporations should pay higher taxes rates than consumers, but most Republican respondents didn’t agree. Democrats who responded to the poll said health care should be the biggest priority in the 2020 elections, followed by taxes. The Republican respondents voted for national security, health care and immigration ahead of taxes.