The IRS claims to not have enough money

Since 1983, after compensating for inflation, the IRS budget has increased by 100%. During that same period, the population of the United States has increased by 39%.

One might think that with the improvement in computer technology that the budget would have increased by far less than 39%, but instead it increased by 100%.

.....And they no longer answer / return phone calls with questions in many cases.

I wonder what the how much salaries have increased relative to inflation......and the employees probably get juicy government pensions when very few people in the private sector receive pensions any longer.

I suspect that the "not answering the phone" is a tactic to gain even more money. Their business is all about data, and there is technology today making data evaluation ever cheaper yet they spend more. It generally matters not which party runs a government bureaucracy..........it tends to waste ever more money as time goes by.

Good morning. Is this the daily thread?

I see it didn't take you boys long to get your hard on for fighting evil on this glorious Sunday morning.

Boilerman is our resident expert on running a business. He wisely informs us Population growth is the only variable to consider when estimating costs. Not inflation, wage growth, technology costs, implementing new laws...or anyhthing else. Just population growth. Perhaps Boilerman can give us the name of a single fortune 500 company whose costs have only risen by 39% sine 1983. Just one name.

Cutting IRS costs is another in a long line of Republican "small government" facades. They want their blank check military, trillion dollar tax cuts, and the great wall of china along the Mexico border....and their going to reconcile it in the budget by cutting the IRS budget by 6 billion....or by killing PBS...or by stopping welfare funded cruises. Its important that people who are good at math vote...otherwise people like Boilerman elect politicians that aren't

The IRS spent how much on a new computer system, only to find out it didn't work and they had to spend more for a different one and it STILL can't function as advertised. How much of our money has the IRS wasted over the years? Poor pitiful IRS, lets get rid of them and go with a flat or fair tax.

PJ, please take note of the 5th word in my initial post. "Since 1983, after compensating for inflation..........."

The "wage growth" that PJ addresses is included as a portion of "inflation", which is addressed above. Furthermore, Boiler points out that technology costs for data evaluation has plummeted since 1983. Every company spends less money to evaluate data. A perfect example is the LTL (less than truckload) transportation industry. It is far cheaper and far faster to send 2000# of product from point A to point B. Cheap computer power gives trucking companies the ability to now quickly consolidate many orders into a single full truckloads. Our product is picked up in Indy, sent to a local hub, then sent 200 miles to a St. Louis hub, then finally packed onto a 3rd truck for the local delivery. I can send a 2000# pallet of product 200 miles for $150 and it'll arrive by the next day. 20 years ago, this order would cost twice as much and it would take 2-3 days.

The IRS evaluates data which is getting cheaper, not more expensive.

Well Ellen, sometimes we just wake up with it

Source?

Why do you care if this is true or not. Will it cause you to agree that the IRS is overspending and needs to have the headcount slashed?