Nope, not a joke. The tax reform did very little to reduce the number of inputs that go into calculating a person's tax, but filing taxes on a postcard was a campaign promise and so they're following through. The postcard will work as is for a large percentage of Americans. If you get all your income from a job or social security, and don't have any itemized deductions or weird tax credits, you're all set with the postcard. For those of us who previously had to file the full 1040, most of the things that used to be on it are now shoved onto one of these new schedules, which seem to have even kept all the same line numbers from the old 1040. Looks like I'll be e-filing Schedules 1, 3, and 4 in addition to the "postcard."