SYSTEMS, METHODS AND ARTICLES FOR GENERATING SUB-GRAPHS OF A TAX CALCULATION GRAPH OF A TAX PREPARATION SYSTEM

Systems, methods and articles of manufacture for generating a sub-graph of a tax calculation graph usable by a tax calculation engine to perform tax calculation operations. The system includes a computing device, a data store in communication with the computing device and a tax preparation software application executable by the computing device. The system comprises a tax calculation graph and a sub-graph engine which executes on the computing device. The sub-graph engine is configured to generate a sub-graph of the tax calculation graph based upon a target node and one or more user enterable nodes selected from the nodes of the tax calculation graph. The sub-graph engine analyzes the tax calculation graph in view of the target node and user enterable nodes and generates a sub-graph which excludes all nodes which are not necessary to calculate the target node.