Hot on the Heels of Grandmas. Yes, dear, it's the IRS.

[MissMarple]

The story is great. The tax investigation trends are depressing.

"Low-income taxpayers earning $25,000 are just as likely to be audited as higher-income taxpayers earning more than $100,000.

About these three-year trends, TRAC says that "criminal enforcement is in shambles"; that there are problems with "corporate responsibility and the Bush administration"; and that the IRS is currently "going after the little guys."

Hmmm. Why my mom? The IRS randomly picks 1.5 percent of taxpayers and then looks for "discrepancies" in the taxpayer's return and bank account. In mom's case, discrepancies did exist. Here's the kicker: My dad died in 2001, and in 2002 my mom and I sold all of his accumulated stuff - his truck, small airplane, motorcycles, and lots and lots of shop tools and toys. Mom also sold their house and bought a condo in town. Money came from all these sales, went into mom's bank account, and then into fixed-income bonds. The IRS is auditing mom because she had "unusual activity in her bank account." Her accountant explained this "unusual activity" to the IRS agent. "Sorry," the agent said, "the audit continues." "

Maybe Lou Dobbs could put the taxes paid by the names of corporations he lists as sending jobs overseas. Now that could be an interesting number. I read recently (I think linked here at DU?) that last year Haliburton paid 15 million. Now what percentage of their income do you think that is?

http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36%257E73%257E1964392,00.html
edited for a better link

[JoePizz]

1. The IRS should be banned from audits that will...

bring in less money than it cost to research and litigate.

Spending $5000 of taxpayer money to go after someone who might end up owing $2500 is stupid.

Spending $1,000,000 on someone who owes $15,000,000 is a good investment.

Oh, wait- wouldn't that mean that most audits would be against wealthy people? Who have more complicated taxes? And are more likely to use loopholes and offshore accounts?

[Tim4319]

4. Pretty much!!!!!1

[Tim4319]

2. I am sorry to hear about what has happened to your mother.

During the "Great" Ronald Reagan era, mother went through a similar ordeal with the IRS, but on a smaller scale. I can understand, somewhat, what you are feeling. It is ashame they are making such a huge deal out of what you mother has in her account but, allow all of these corporations to practically do what they want to do. I hope all goes well with the audit!

Tim

[MissMarple]

9. Thanks, Tim, but it wasn't MY mom. It was the author's mom.

But thanks anyway. It very well could have been. Our government is becoming a shambles.

[pnb]

3. Wouldn't that be profiling?

Picking a certain subset of the population and checking them more for a specific crime?

[JoePizz]

6. Sort of

There are 2 ways to look at this:

THE CHRIS MATHEWS WAY- After 9/11 he said only (or primarily) checking Arab men at Airports would be OK, since the hijackers were Middle Eastern. By the same logic, only looking at rich people or corporations for auditing would be OK since most people guilty of large scale tax evasion are wealthy (or corporations).

THE COMMON SENSE WAY- As I said, spending $5000 to get $2500 is simply stupid. All you have to do, though, is set the computers to disallow any tax return and bank account that have descrapancies smaller than a certain amount. In other words, unless there is a huge descrepancy, throw it out and randomly pick another person. Run through the same criteria as above.

[tobius]

8. and then publicize the number so everybody could keep it below! nt

[ixion]

5. 'unusual activity' must mean

that there was money in the account. :eyes:

[PragMantisT]

7. We only have to worry about the IRS for a couple more years

Didn't Congress waste time in the 90's with a law which will dissolve the IRS in 2006? Oh yeah, as long as there is something else in place to do the pushing and shoving.