Written by Adam Andrzejewski, RealClearInvestigation
Top line: The investigation found that about 6,000 Internal Revenue Service employees and contractors owe $50 million in back taxes. Federal Audit It was published in July.
Key Facts: Tax evaders make up 5% of IRS employees, and of those, about two-thirds don’t do proper tax planning.
Federal law requires the IRS to fire employees who knowingly fail to pay taxes, but the inspector general said “this disciplinary action is not always enforced.”
The IRS disciplined 1,068 employees between October 2021 and April 2023, including 139 for “willfully” mispaying taxes, but only 20 were fired. Other employees received “reduced” punishments because they had been with the IRS longer or had higher job performance ratings.
76 employees were suspended, mostly for less than two weeks.
The inspectors also found that the IRS rehired 397 employees and 115 contractors who had previous behavioral issues, including 282 workers who had one or more behavioral or performance issues. The “behavioral issues” ranged from unauthorized access to tax returns to sexual assault and criminal activity. Of those, 85 had previous tax issues and 306 had “unacceptable” job performance.
background: a Previous Audit The federal government as a whole had 149,000 employees in 2021 and was found to owe $1.5 billion in unpaid taxes.
Meanwhile, the public continues to pay into the IRS’ $4.9 billion payroll. In 2022, the IRS paid 11,846 people six-figure salaries, according to payroll records. Open the Books.
This includes employees who are allegedly employed to assist taxpayers.Taxpayer Experience Officer” made $200,000 and “National Taxpayer Advocate” made $203,000.
Search all federal, state and local government payroll and vendor spending Benjamin, the AI search bot at OpenTheBooks.com.
Important Quotes: “Thank you for your efforts to restore trust in the IRS by holding it accountable to taxpayers,” said Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa). letter The letter was addressed to IRS Commissioner Daniel Wurfel: “Today is a perfect day to demonstrate the seriousness of our commitment to forcing the IRS’s thousands of fraudulent tax collectors to pay their taxes or get out. If IRS inspectors cannot pass tax audits, taxpayers will never trust the IRS.”
Senator Ernst led the congressional action that mandated the audit and led to these disclosures.
summary: The salaries of around 6,000 employees working in the tax collection agency are paid by hardworking taxpayers so it is insanity to think that they are tax evaders.
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Distributed with permission From RealClearWire.
