The straight text of the U.S. tax code exceeds 5,000 pages. Throw in the annotations necessary to actually decipher the thing and it swells beyond 72,000 pages. (Instructions for filing the “EZ” form run 41 pages.) All of which will yield a whopping $2.6 trillion in federal tax receipts (estimated) for 2012. So, naturally, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has concocted new regulations that make the preparation of tax returns even more difficult and costly. The new rules require tax preparers who aren’t lawyers or Certified Public Accountants to obtain …
President Obama is fond of saying he hasn’t raised anyone’s taxes. How soon he forgets the $500 billion tax hike in his health care law. Obamacare raised 18 separate taxes and included a brand new 10 percent excise tax on tanning beds. The tanning bed tax started in July 2010. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) should have little trouble collecting this ridiculous tax. It already collects several other excise taxes on things like alcohol, tobacco, and gas. And the federal government has collected excises since the beginning of the republic. …
President Obama has some explaining to do. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) yesterday revealed that 3,700 federal contractors — who were recipients of $24 billion dollars in stimulus funds — are tax evaders. In total, they owed the government at least $757 million dollars – probably more since the IRS databases don’t include those who didn’t file taxes or haven’t yet been assessed. And it goes even further than that. The Washington Times reports:
Government employees owe $3.3 billion in back taxes, CNBC reports. According to Heritage Foundation fellow James Sherk, the typical federal worker “receives 22 percent more in wages than an equally skilled private sector worker … .” And, says Sherk, when both wages and benefits are toted up, federal workers are overpayed by $40 billion to $50 billion per year. You’d think they would be able to pay their taxes.
The Senate failed today to repeal one of the more troublesome provisions of Obamacare. Tucked away in the legislation that made Obamacare into law is a tax provision that will be a compliance nightmare for businesses when it goes into effect in 2012. The provision calls for all businesses to file 1099 forms with the IRS for all transactions with other businesses over $600. This new requirement will force businesses to divert scarce resources to complying with additional bureaucratic red tape that they could better use creating new jobs. The …
Tucked away in the legislation that made Obamacare into law is a tax provision that will be a compliance nightmare for small businesses if it ever goes into effect. The provision calls for all businesses to file 1099 forms with the IRS for all transactions with other businesses over $600. Businesses are not like individuals. They purchase lots of items in large quantities. As a result, if the Obamacare reporting requirement goes into effect as scheduled in 2012, it would create an enormous compliance burden on businesses. Businesses would have …
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) recently unearthed yet another undesirable side effect of Obamacare—one that will hit the taxman as well as business owners. The Taxpayer Advocate Service, “an independent organization within the IRS whose employees assist taxpayers,” reports that both the IRS and taxpayers will have trouble complying with the health care law’s extensive new tax reporting regulations. The regs will affect 40 million businesses, from international mega-corporations to Mom-and-Pop shops on Main Street. The Taxpayer Advocate Service says it “may propose administrative or legislative recommendations to modify the …
Andy Roth, Vice President of Club for Growth, highlighted a Boston Herald article about renovations to an IRS facility in a tweet he sent out this week: An IRS facility in Mass. will include a reflecting pool, an art gallery, and indoor gardens. – http://bit.ly/cxTHEPless than a minute ago via TweetDeckAndy Rothandyroth The Herald reports that the Andover, Massachusetts facility will boast a host of new amenities after its makeover, including “a reflecting pool, an art gallery, indoor gardens, a 7,000-square-foot cafeteria, and an amphitheater” but concedes that “it remains unclear …
Obamacare requires all individuals to carry health insurance for themselves and their families. Those who don’t will have to pay a penalty. And the IRS is the agency charged with making sure the uninsured pony up. Just how will the IRS do that? It’s not something lawmakers got around to actually, you know, writing down in any detail in that big bill. That’s even harder to do than reading that monster. But now that they’ve made Obamacare the law of the land, they’re starting to take an interest in the …
Roberton Williams and Rosanne Altshuler’s Five Myths About Your Taxes in the Washington Post on Sunday was such a useful piece one hesitates to criticize, but one confusion is so unfortunate that a correction is necessary. In all, the authors got about 3 and a half right out of five, which at the start of baseball season is really pretty good. They were right when pointing out that most people (75 percent by their estimates) pay some federal tax, even the many of the poor and virtually all the rich. …
