Hi, I'm Thomas. I'm an English expatriate living in Philadelphia, and this is my first post. Most of my time is taken up with an interesting scheme to reduce the gap between rich and poor; I'm very excited about it.
Well, here's my first post. My name's Thomas; I'm English, but I emigrated to Pennsylvania in my late twenties (possibly temporarily, but it's been four years so far). I believe it's the duty of everyone in society to be politically active, so even though I can't vote in the US, I take a lively interest in what goes on, and volunteer where I can.
I work for a consultancy in Philadelphia called Solutions for Progress. I'm a programmer, and my specific job is helping out with a project called The Benefit Bank. In past years, people with low incomes have been able to come to sites who run our program (mainly churches and other community organisations) and spend an hour or so entering information about their household and sources of income; the system would then electronically file their federal and state income taxes, tell them what government benefits they're eligible for (food stamps, cash assistance, heating and cooling subsidies, help with the rent, and so on), and automatically fill in all the necessary (often quite intimidating) forms. The effect is that people who are having to squeeze the last out of every dollar go home with some extra cash, often quite a bit. The system was paid for either by the sites who ran it or by grants from charities or governments; we never charged the users themselves, so every dollar went into their pockets.
Anyway, it was a good idea, but quite limited as far as it went, because there had to be a network of sites absolutely everywhere, and people had to know to go to a site to get their taxes done. So this year, now that tax season is upon us once more, the company has decided to open up the system to anyone in the US who can get online. There was some talk of charging some small amount, but the latest word is that it will actually be free for everyone. If it takes off, it will be a wonderful opportunity to reduce the divide between rich and poor a little, and I'm really excited to be a part of it all.