The reason things are so complicated is because there is money to be made in it. A form of job security if you will. Like the government worker that overcomplicates their once simple job functions to the point where only they can do it. Why else would we have a 40,000+ page (and growing) tax code? Yet, as complicated as our idiotic tax code is, there are still programs out there that can walk an average Joe through their taxes for about $50.