What’s Tax Got to Do With It?

By Allan Rolnick, CPA

As is usually the case with Twitter’s outrage du jour, the truth is somewhat less dramatic. Last May, the Treasury estimated that an extra $80 billion would help the Service hire 86,582 new full-time equivalents by the end of 2031. Now, if those hires were going on top tually appropriate those dollars – usually one of those predictably desperate 11th-hour bids to avoid a government shutdown. As we said here in August, “We can be sure that future congresses and presidents will want their own say on IRS spending.” repurpose $20 billion of the additional 2030 and 2031 appropriations for “other non-defense priorities.” of the 80,411 already working for the Service at the end of 2021, that would be something! But 50,000 of those current employees are expected to retire in the next five years. So most of the new spending will go towards keeping current staffing stable.

The bottom line here is that opponents of IRS funding got themselves a symbolic scalp. However, the Biden administration says it won’t torpedo nearterm plans to boost audits and compliance. As for the “out years” 2030 and 2031, the earth could get hit by a comet before those cuts ever materialize. (Some people are actually rooting for it.)

But wait . . . there’s more. Last August, when the IRA passed, we pointed out there was no guarantee the IRS would even get the money. The Act authorized it. But it’s up to future Congresses to ac -

Less than ten months later, that day has come. Last week, in a predictably desperate 11th-hour bid to avoid a government shutdown, Washington passed the “Fiscal Responsibility Act” suspending the federal debt limit through January 2025. That act claws back $1.4 billion of this year’s new funding. (IRS officials can cut it from anywhere in their budget except the $8 billion allocated to taxpayer service and systems modernization.) It also includes a “handshake agreement” to

Here’s the moral of this week’s story. Uncle Sam needs money to operate. Reasonable people can certainly disagree on how much he needs and where he should find it. But once legislators make those decisions, somebody has to go out and actually collect it for him. And saddling taxpayers with our current creaky IRS infrastructure adds insult to injury and wastes even more money in the process. (Also, if you ever get trapped in that sticky red tape yourself, you’ll be glad you’ve got us on your side!)