You Will Be Audited
Essex & Associates::www.essexinc.biz August 23, 2011
Greetings!
More IRS Cops, More Audits, Says Treasury Report
The IRS continues to add employees. 2,000 additional tax enforcers were added last year alone. These numbers will soon be even higher because the collection folks are unable to work all of the existing accounts with current staffing, the report says. Sounds like a call for more compliance staff, and more exams. Watch out.
The number of federal individual income tax returns examined by the Internal Revenue Service has continuously increased over the past five years, up 23% according to a statistical report released August 17, 2011 by the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration. Also, the IRS increased the overall use of enforcement tools (liens, levies, and seizures).
Blame Congress. TIGTA gives the IRS credit for having to operate in an environment of ever changing tax laws. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, for example, included 56 tax provisions (20 related to individual taxpayers), and The Worker, Homeownership, and Business Assistance Act of 2009 revised the First-Time Homebuyer Credit, causing untold confusion. More tax laws mean more to enforce; more changes mean it's more likely taxpayers will mess up.
What is perhaps the most troubling for taxpayers is the increased use of liens, levies and seizures. The use of liens has increased by 74 percent since fiscal year 2006, with this year's increase the largest since fiscal year 2007. The total number of levies increased by 4 percent, and the total number of seizures increased 4 percent.
Wishing you many happy returns,
Wayne
Wayne T. Essex Ph.D.
Essex & Associates
Tax, Accounting, HR, Payroll
7501 Paragon Road
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