Congress asked the IRS to implement a massive new law. Now it could send more than half its workers

[Eugene]

Source: Washington Post

Congress asked the IRS to implement a massive new law. Now it could send more than half its workers home

By Jeff Stein January 19 at 10:49 AM

In 2017, Republicans handed the Internal Revenue Service a huge task. In 2018, Congress is about to send home much of the agency's workforce.

The architects of the recently passed Republican tax law are relying on the tens of thousands of IRS employees to turn their new vision for the tax code into reality.

IRS attorneys have to issue new guidelines to resolve legal questions unresolved by the legislation. Computer programmers have to update IRS software for processing tax forms. Call centers have to answer questions from confused taxpayers.

But now the IRS, like the rest of Washington, faces the threat of a government shutdown — one that would deprive the federal agency about 56 percent of its workforce, according to the U.S. Treasury, just as that workforce is needed for one of its biggest jobs in decades. Tax experts and former IRS officials are warning that a prolonged shutdown could exacerbate the challenge the already-strained agency faces in implementing the complicated new GOP tax law.

-snip-

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/01/19/congress-asked-the-irs-to-implement-a-massive-new-law-now-it-could-send-90-percent-of-its-workers-home/

[mr_lebowski]

1. Hey, sounds like we need Cambridge Analytica, TO THE RESCUE! (at huge taxpayer expense)

... and other assorted Trump cronies, hired without oversight or regard to cost ostensibly due to it being an 'emergency' (caused by the DEMOCRATS, believe me, everyone knows ...)