By Adam Andrzejewski for RealClearInvestigations
Topline: Almost 6,000 Inner Income Service workers and contractors owe $50 million in overdue taxes, in accordance with a federal audit revealed in July.
Key details: The tax-dodging workers characterize 5% of the IRS workforce. Roughly two-thirds of them nonetheless should not have a plan in place to pay their taxes correctly.
Federal regulation requires the IRS to fireside staff who deliberately don’t pay their taxes, however auditors mentioned, “this disciplinary action is not always enforced.”
The IRS disciplined 1,068 workers between October 2021 and April 2023 — together with 139 who “willfully” paid their taxes incorrectly — however solely 20 of them had been fired. Others had their circumstances “mitigated” as a result of they’d been working for the IRS for a very long time or had excessive job efficiency rankings.
Seventy-six workers had been suspended, largely for 2 weeks or much less.
Auditors additionally discovered that the IRS rehired 397 workers and 115 contractors who beforehand had conduct points, together with 282 staff with multiple conduct or efficiency problem. The “conduct issues” ranged from unauthorized entry to taxpayer returns to sexual assault and legal behaviors. Eighty-five of them beforehand had points paying their taxes, and 306 had “unacceptable” job efficiency.
Background: A earlier audit discovered that the federal authorities as an entire had 149,000 workers with $1.5 billion in unpaid taxes in 2021.
In the meantime, on a regular basis residents proceed to fund the IRS’ $4.9 billion payroll. The company paid six-figure salaries to 11,846 folks in 2022, in accordance with payroll information at OpenTheBooks.com.
That features workers supposedly employed to assist taxpayers. The IRS’ “taxpayer experience officer” makes $200,000, and the “national taxpayer advocate” makes $203,000.
Search all federal, state and native authorities salaries and vendor spending with the AI search bot, Benjamin, at OpenTheBooks.com.
Vital quote: “Thank you for committing to ‘trying to rebuild trust’ in the IRS by holding the agency ‘accountable to taxpayers,’” Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA) wrote in a letter to IRS Commissioner Daniel Werfel. “Today is a great day to demonstrate the seriousness of that pledge by making the thousands of tax-evading tax collectors at the IRS either pay up or pack up. Taxpayers will never trust the IRS when the agency’s own auditors can’t even pass a tax audit.”
Sen. Ernst spearheaded the Congressional measure mandating the audit and main to those disclosures.
Abstract: It’s loopy to assume that almost 6,000 workers working for the tax assortment company – whose salaries are paid by laborious working taxpayers – are tax cheats!
The #WasteOfTheDay is dropped at you by CEO & founder, Adam Andrzejewski, with Jeremy Portnoy. Study extra at OpenTheBooks.com.
Syndicated with permission from RealClearWire.
