We’ve been skeptical of grandiose promises to close the so-called tax gap for years (here, here, here).  Part of that skepticism stems from the blatant self-interest of those making the estimates – we could raise billions, trillions, quadrillions if only you gave us more money! (Perhaps the CRS or JCT could be in charge of making these estimates in the future?)

Last week’s piece from The Hill is a perfect example.  Under the breathless headline, “Lucrative IRS program targeting wealthy tax cheats is withering from a lack of funds,” the article reveals many things, none of which …

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Worried about your privacy?  You should be.  Congress is back and is quietly moving legislation that threatens the privacy and security of millions of business owners, charities, foundations, and investors.

The bill is called the Establishing New Authorities for Business Laundering and Enabling Risks to Security (ENABLERS) Act, and it has already passed the House as a rider on the annual National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).

In simple terms, the Act would dramatically expand the Corporate Transparency Act’s (CTA) reporting requirements imposed on business owners and their employees. Here’s how Bloomberg describes the policies:

This is where tax professionals come in. The …

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ADP is out with its revised, independent jobs forecast this week and it shows continued challenges for Main Street.  As with past reports (before they revamped the product to produce a truly independent alternative to the monthly BLS reports), the latest data shows a continued divergence in the economy, with larger businesses adding jobs while smaller firms shed them.

According to ADP, private employers created 132,000 net jobs in August. But while large firms (those with more than 500 employees) added 54,000 jobs, small businesses with less than 20 employees contracted by roughly the same amount, losing 47,000 jobs. As …

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The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) has kicked off a rigorous debate over the $80 billion in new funding for the IRS. Republicans argue the funds will be used to audit the middle-class while the Biden Administration assures us that nobody under $400,000 will see increased audit “rates.”

So where does the truth lie?  In short, the IRA will substantially increase the number of IRS audits over the next decade, including higher numbers of audits for middle-income taxpayers and Main Street businesses. Here’s the breakdown.

The IRA allocates some $80 billion over the next decade in additional funding to the tax-collecting agency, with …

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The Main Street business community today sent a letter to lawmakers with a simple message: many of the proposed tax policies in the Inflation Reduction Act would harm individually and family-owned businesses and should be rejected.

The letter was signed by more than 70 trade associations representing millions of Main Street businesses from every corner of the country and every sector of the economy, including NFIB, the National Restaurant Association, the Associated Builders and Contractors, the National Association of Homebuilders, and others.  It makes clear that the Inflation Reduction Act, which the House is expected to take up …

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