Would you trust the CRA to do your taxes for you?

If someone can’t handle the tasks required of them at their current job, is it wise to hand them a massive new set of responsibilities? If you think not, consider the implications of the Trudeau government’s recent Throne Speech pledge to implement what it calls an “automatic tax filing” system. It won’t actually be “automatic,” of course, but rather would entail entrusting the army of nearly 44,000 bureaucrats working at the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) to file millions of Canadians’ income tax forms on their behalf. And though most people would certainly enjoy being spared precious hours on a task that can by turns be painfully complex and mind-numbingly tedious, given the importance of the job and the track record of the agency in question, it’s fair to ask how much faith one should have in the final product.