All that coverage dismissing concerns that the $80 billion influx would be used to beef up IRS enforcement seems to have been intentionally misleading.
All that coverage dismissing concerns that the $80 billion influx would be used to beef up IRS enforcement seems to have been intentionally misleading.
I n 2022, when the public learned that the Inflation Reduction Act earmarked an astonishing $80 billion for the Internal Revenue Service, the corporate press insisted everyone remain calm.
The $80 billion provided by President Biden’s massive social-welfare spending legislation would be used only on the other guys, members of the press argued. You know, the millionaires and billionaires. Don’t listen to the critics, advised our commentariat. It’s a conspiracy to think an IRS wealthier by $80 billion will translate into an auditor-hiring binge and an overabundance of scrutiny and red tape for workers and middle-class families. Indeed, credulous newsrooms claimed at the time, the $80 billion will mostly address “workforce attrition.”
On April 7, 2023, Politico scored a scoop: The IRS is on track to grow its workforce to levels not seen since the late 1990s. So much for “workforce attrition.”
“The IRS aims to employ 105,187 workers by 2025, swelling the agency ranks by nearly 50 percent within three years to workforce levels not seen for a quarter-century,” the report says, citing exclusively obtained IRS projections. Commissioner Danny Werfel and the Treasury Department are looking “to transform tax enforcement and administration with a new $80 billion windfall provided last August by Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act.”
The Politico report adds (emphasis mine): “With that extra pot of money alone, the agency plans to bring on around 27,000 new employees by fiscal year 2025.”
The U.S. Treasury estimated in 2021 that an appropriation of $80 billion would enable the IRS to hire up to 87,000 new agents. The IRS’s current hiring projections aren’t quite that high — yet — but increasing the agency’s ranks by “nearly 50 percent” is hefty by any measure.
On another IRS matter, this week CBS News likewise scored a hot scoop: “Starting next year, a new IRS rule will require anyone earning over $600 on payment apps, like Venmo, in 2023 to receive a 1099-K form. The old threshold was earning $20,000 over 200 transactions.”
In retrospect, the press’s earlier coverage of that $80 billion injection sure looks gullible. And all that coverage dismissing concerns about an IRS hiring spree and increased enforcement efforts against workers and middle-class families seems intentionally misleading.
“Don’t worry,” CNBC reported on August 31, 2022, “the IRS isn’t hiring an ‘army’ of auditors — here’s what’s really happening.” The newsgroup informed us that in fact the Treasury Department said the IRS could use an $80 billion appropriation to “rebuild” and “revitalize” the agency.
“In other words, that figure is not from the IRS or from the official law (how exactly the agency will spend the money remains to be seen),” CNBC reported. “It’s an estimate that accounts for a huge amount of attrition at the agency.”
At NBC News, an August 12, 2022, headline read: “Right-wing outcry over IRS funding builds as agency workers describe shortages of staff and printer paper.”
Printer paper? Is the implication here that the IRS needs an influx of $80 billion because of the cost of basic office supplies? Perhaps some of that $80 billion can go toward transitioning the IRS away from paper and into the exciting new era of electronic communication.
NPR reported, “The IRS just got $80 billion to beef up. A big goal? Going after rich tax dodgers.”
“Some of that money will go to update decades-old computer systems,” the NPR report notes, and “some is for improving customer service, including a taxpayer phone line where nine out of 10 calls go unanswered.”
“Most of the money, though,” NPR allows, “is for stepped-up enforcement — to help the IRS collect more of the estimated $600 billion in taxes that go unpaid every year, much of it owed by rich people who under-report their income. . . . Wealthy people have more opportunities to avoid taxes. Their income sources are often less transparent. And they can hire lawyers and accountants to sidestep the IRS, which is frequently outgunned.”
So, to recap: The IRS intends to balloon its workforce — a thing we were explicitly told would not happen. And it intends to target middle-class families and earners — a thing we were explicitly told would not happen.
Who could’ve seen this coming? Who could’ve seen this except for perhaps everyone with eyes and ears? Of course the IRS intends to grow its workforce. It was always going to grow its workforce! You’d better believe that the bureaucrats at the IRS took notice of that Treasury estimate of enough funding for 87,000 new hires.
And of course the IRS intends to implement a $600 reporting requirement. The feds are dead set on that matter. Recall that the IRS tried to implement the $600 reporting requirement last year but delayed it, citing “a number of concerns regarding the timeline of implementation of these changes.” Also, recall that the Affordable Care Act in 2010 had a similar 1099 reporting requirement for businesses, which was “designed to raise revenues to finance health reform.” The requirement, which would’ve applied to “all purchases made from any vendor totaling $600 or more per year,” was eventually scuttled. Now, it’s back. Call it bureaucratic tunnel vision. The feds want that $600 reporting requirement, and they want it badly. The Treasury report, the repeated efforts to implement a $600 reporting requirement — there was a reason why conservatives were justifiably concerned about the $80 billion for the IRS. It doesn’t take a genius to guess where all those new resources will be put to use.
Why, you may ask, did so many in the press reflexively dismiss these concerns? Why did so many of them accept the line that $80 billion would simply go toward maintenance and “workforce attrition,” even though members of the press likewise stand to suffer at the hands of an overgrown IRS? The answer is that most reporters, no matter how bright, cannot see beyond party affiliation. It’s their loss, really. It’s going to be a rude awakening the day they discover that merely being a loyal liberal doesn’t exempt them from digging the ditches with the rest of us.