I 108th CONGRESS 2d Session H. R. 4109 IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES April 1, 2004 Mr. Burns introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Ways and Means A BILL To allow seniors with Social Security and pension income to file their income tax returns on a new Form 1040SR without regard to the amount of interest or taxable income of the senior.

1.

Short title

This Act may be cited as the &short-title1;.

2.

Findings

The Congress finds the following: (1)More than 35,000,000 individuals are prohibited from using Form 1040EZ to file their income tax returns simply because they are age 62 or older. (2)The Congress should aggressively seek to end age discrimination in Federal tax regulation. (3)The Internal Revenue Service reports that each year seniors file more than 11,000,000 tax returns claiming only the standard deduction. Because some tax returns are joint returns, standard-deduction returns represent close to 15,000,000 seniors. Many, if not all, of these seniors would appreciate the option of a simple and less time-consuming Federal tax return. (4)The Internal Revenue Service reports that processing a Form 1040 costs the Government—and, therefore, taxpayers—50 percent more than processing a Form 1040EZ.

3.

Form 1040SR for certain seniors

(a)

In general

An eligible senior (and, in the case of a joint return, such individual’s spouse) shall not be treated as ineligible to use the form referred to in subsection (b) to file the return of tax imposed under section 1 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 for any taxable year beginning after the date of the enactment of this Act on the basis of— (1)such individual receiving any social security benefit or any distribution from a retirement plan, (2)the amount of such taxpayer’s taxable interest income, or (3)the amount of such taxpayer’s taxable income. (b)

Form 1040SR

The Secretary of the Treasury shall develop a form for purposes of carrying out subsection (a). Such form shall be similar to Form 1040EZ, known as Form 1040SR, and a single page which is 8 1/2 inches by 11 inches in size with clear and reasonable type. (c)

Eligible senior

For purposes of this section, the term eligible senior means, with respect to any taxable year, any individual who has attained age 62 as of the close of such taxable year.