The details of the current scandal at the Internal Revenue Service are straightforward, which might be surprising, given the reputation of the agency.

In 1984, CompuServe launched the first “Electronic Mall,” a Pleistocene-era Amazon with which owners of a TRS-80 personal computer could browse and buy goods over the Internet. Such modern retailers as “The Record Emporium” and “The Book Bazaar” were given prominent virtual storefronts. A full page ad in the May 1984 issue of Online Today boasted, “By the year 2000, the world may catch up with the way CompuServe’s new Electronic Mall lets you shop today.” The world took less time to catch up than that: By 1995, eBay and Amazon had been incorporated; in Amazon’s first two months as an online bookstore, it averaged $20,000 per week in sales. Americans would go on to spend around $700 million online in 1996, and by 1999 sales had grown to $20 billion. Figures released earlier this year by the Commerce Department revealed that Americans spent $225 billion online in 2012—a 400 percent increase in only a decade.

Many liberals, myself included, are frustrated by the mainstream conversation on entitlement spending, which holds as gospel that we need cuts to our two major retirement programs, Social Security and Medicare. But only one of them–Medicare–faces the prospect of high long-term costs. Social Security, by contrast, is a stable and well-funded program, and needs slight adjustments–at most–to ensure its long-term stability.

As a general matter, I think the best reason for government not to go around competing with private industry isn't that doing so inherently diminishes our freedom, but because it's just not worth the effort, and much of the time it isn't going to provide any benefit to consumers. It wouldn't be tyrannical for the federal government to produce its own brand of cola, but it would be pointless, since they're unlikely to make something people will like better than Coke or Pepsi, and consumers seem to be perfectly happy with their current cola options. On the other hand, there are some areas where the market has clearly failed—health insurance for senior citizens, for instance (and, I'd argue, everyone else too, but that's a separate topic)—where it makes sense for the government to step in.

But what about areas where the market in question involves private companies helping consumers interact with the government itself? And where there isn't a particularly egregious market failure, but the government could clearly offer people the same service for which they're now paying, but at a lower price? Like, say, zero? In that case, it would be hard to argue that the government would be outside its rights if it made it easier for people to interact with it, solely on the basis that those private companies might suffer from the competition. Well, according to a story from Pro Publica, that's what's happening in the area of tax preparation:

Today the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose above 14,270—completely erasing its 54 percent loss between 2007 and 2009.

The stock market is basically back to where it was in 2000, while corporate earnings have doubled since then.

Yet the real median wage is now 8 percent below what it was in 2000, and unemployment remains sky-high.

Why is the stock market doing so well, while most Americans are doing so poorly? Four reasons:

At this point, odds are low for a deal to avert the sequester. Republicans want an agreement to replace the planned across-the-board spending cuts—which include cuts to defense spending—with ones that target social spending and entitlements. President Obama is willing to compromise on spending cuts, but insists on new revenues. "Balanced" deficit reduction—a key part of his reelection platform—is still a priority for the administration, and it commands wide support from the public.

The Senate vote just before dawn in favor of a permanent tax hike on the top one percent defers virtually all of the other budget battles. Assuming the House follows suit today, it is up to President Obama and the Democrats to radically change the conversation.