IRS Budget too small to do its job

http://www.usatoday.com/money/perfi/taxes/story/2012-01-11/irs-taxpayer-advocate-report/52496370/1

A new federal report warned today that the Internal Revenue Service's budget is too small and its workload too heavy for the agency to give taxpayers adequate service or protect their tax rights fully.

The problems have grown so serious that National Taxpayer Advocate Nina Olson, in delivering her office's annual report to Congress, called for enactment of a comprehensive taxpayer bill of rights to protect Americans from being improperly penalized.

"The overriding challenge facing the IRS is that its workload has grown significantly in recent years, while its funding is being cut," Olson said of the findings. "This is causing the IRS to resort to shortcuts that undermine fundamental taxpayer rights and harm taxpayers — and at the same time reduces the IRS' ability to deliver on its core mission of raising revenue."

Driving the IRS workload increase is increasing complexity of federal tax laws and regulations and frequent changes in the tax code — an estimated 579 changes in 2010 alone that had to be explained to taxpayers, entered in IRS computers and added to the agency's auditor training programs.

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