https://www.propublica.org/article/inside-turbotax-20-year-fight-to-stop-americans-from-filing-their-taxes-for-free

"Americans’ anxiety around tax filing is so powerful that it usually trumps any frustration with the TurboTax product, according to three former Intuit staffers. So even if customers click on “free” and are ultimately asked to pay, they will usually do it rather than start the entire process anew. Intuit capitalized on this tendency by making sure the paywall popped up only when the taxpayer was deep into the filing process."

Not the best pull quote, but like... They've been up to this shit for twenty fucking years.
@LexYeen Because of my spouse's business, we'd started to cough up the big bucks to have someone do our taxes for us, and it still stresses me the heck out to make sure to find all the relevant documents in time :(