> The IRS does not focus a large share of its energy on poorer people.
This is just untrue. In 2021, almost all of the IRS' enforcement energy is focused on poor people. This is continuing a trend that has gone on for 30+ years now of steadily reducing enforcement on the rich and holding it steady or increasing it on the poor, particularly aiming at anyone who claims the Earned Income Tax Credit.
The IRS audits half as many people as it did just five years ago. It audits 1/5th as many people as it did in the 1970s. And these cuts have applied mainly to the top end of the income spectrum. Somehow it passed without much public notice that Trump's budgets massively slashed an already severely underfunded IRS.
In fact, the IRS has now ceased reporting its audit rates of the rich and large corporations, because they're so low, so we no longer even know how low they are.
Thank you for this. This seems to be of quite a lot of significance, and I've not heard it mentioned even on alternative media (although, granted, I'm not from the US so I don't follow as closely as a local would).
This is just untrue. In 2021, almost all of the IRS' enforcement energy is focused on poor people. This is continuing a trend that has gone on for 30+ years now of steadily reducing enforcement on the rich and holding it steady or increasing it on the poor, particularly aiming at anyone who claims the Earned Income Tax Credit.
The IRS audits half as many people as it did just five years ago. It audits 1/5th as many people as it did in the 1970s. And these cuts have applied mainly to the top end of the income spectrum. Somehow it passed without much public notice that Trump's budgets massively slashed an already severely underfunded IRS.
In fact, the IRS has now ceased reporting its audit rates of the rich and large corporations, because they're so low, so we no longer even know how low they are.
https://www.propublica.org/article/has-the-irs-hit-bottom