USA 2024 Elections Thread

Thu Aug 18 14:58:03 PDT 2022

Increasing Taxes, Arming Revenuers, Auditing People, Pork Spending,
Raising Debt... all surefire ways to piss off any electorate when
they wake up...

USA is literally bankrupt, only massive cuts will solve it, not taxes...
https://usdebtclock.org/
https://usadebtclock.com/
https://usdebtclock.day/
https://www.worldometers.info/us-debt-clock/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Debt_Clock

Taxation Is Theft (and War)...
https://duckduckgo.com/?iax=videos&ia=videos&q=taxation+is+theft
https://duckduckgo.com/?iax=videos&ia=videos&q=taxation+is+war

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/history-u-s-taxation/
https://taxfoundation.org/independence-day-taxes-then-and-now/
https://taxfoundation.org/taxation-representation-american-revolution/
https://yalebooks.yale.edu/2017/06/07/did-taxes-cause-the-american-revolution/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_taxation_in_the_United_States
https://libertarianstandard.com/

The USA did just fine with trivial to no taxation.
Then GovCorp Politicians ruined it without consideration of the people,
a Deep State if you will...
https://twitter.com/TulsiGabbard/status/1560220066678837248

Per recent rumblings... all fine component grounds for another Revolution.
Expect fun in 2024.

Data Shows Number Of Low-Income Audits Could Triple As IRS Grows

https://www.theepochtimes.com/data-shows-number-of-low-income-audits-could-triple-as-irs-grows_4671775.html
https://www.heritage.org/budget-and-spending/commentary/fact-checking-team-biden-who-those-87000-new-irs-agents-would-audit
https://www.cbo.gov/system/files/2022-08/hr5376_IR_Act_8-3-22.pdf
https://gop-waysandmeans.house.gov/brady-on-manchin-biden-bill-attention-wal-mart-shoppers-more-irs-audits-headed-your-way/

The Internal Revenue Service Headquarters Building in Washington on
Sept. 19, 2018. (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times)

The IRS audited 197 low-income families for every high-wealth family
in 2019, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO)—a
number that some experts expected to climb under an IRS turbocharged
with more money and manpower.

Over the next decade, the Democrat’s new “Inflation Reduction Act”
will provide the IRS with 87,000 new agents and $80 billion in
funding, with nearly $46 billion earmarked for enforcement.

According to the Congressional Budget Office, the tax and spend bill
is projected to bring in $203.7 billion in revenue from 2022 to 2031.

President Joe Biden’s administration has promised no new taxes or
audits on households making less than $400,000 per year.

But experts say that promise may be hard to keep.

A previous CBO analysis using a similar funding plan featured in the
Inflation Reduction Act found audit rates would be restored to levels
around 10 years ago. The analysis showed the audit rates would rise
for all taxpayers, but the ones with higher incomes would face the
biggest increase.

The oldest data available in the 2022 Government Accountability Office
report released this year was for 2010. That’s when the IRS was better
funded and staffed with some 95,000 full time employees.

>From 2010-2019, the IRS audited 0.9 percent across all income groups
compared to 0.25 percent now.

Rachel Greszler, a budget and entitlements senior research fellow at
the Heritage Foundation, told The Epoch Times that even returning to
the 2010 audit levels for those making more than $400,000 per year,
would still fall short of the IRS’s revenue goal.

“My rough estimate shows that returning to the 2010 audit levels for
all income groups would only generate a little over 20 percent of the
bills’ estimated enforcement revenues in 2031,” she said.

In her commentary on the Heritage Foundation’s website Aug. 12,
Greszler wrote the numbers don’t add up using 2019 data either without
the lower- and middle-class.

Even increasing recent audit rates 30-fold for taxpayers making over
$400,000—including 100 percent audit rates on taxpayers with incomes
over $10 million—still would fall more than 20 percent short of
raising the estimated $35.3 billion in new revenues by 2031, she
wrote.

So it stands to reason that taxpayers can expect audit rates more like
those about a decade ago.

GAO statistics show a larger number of audits in 2010 for taxpayers in
the $0-$24,999 tax bracket than the high wealth households. About
579,000 audits were performed on the lowest tax bracket in 2010,
compared to 197,000 in 2019.

Yet for the wealthy, high wealth audits of $10 million or more stood
at 2,800 in 2010, dipping to 1,000 in 2019.

While a higher percentage of high wealthy households is audited more
than poor ones, the lower class sees more audits overall.

A better-funded IRS in 2010 audited the poor much more aggressively
than the super wealthy—at a rate of 207 to 1.

In recent years, the IRS audited taxpayers with incomes below $25,000
and those with incomes of $500,000 or more at higher-than-average
rates. But, audit rates have dropped for all income levels—with audit
rates falling the most for taxpayers with incomes of $200,000 or more,
according to the GAO report.

The Inflation Reduction Act, which is a scaled-down version of Build
Back Better negotiated by Democrats Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and
Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), took Republicans by surprise. The measure
passed the Democratic-controlled Senate and Congress last week through
a reconciliation process.
President Joe Biden (C) signs the Inflation Reduction Act with (L-R)
Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer
(D-N.Y.), House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.), Rep. Frank
Pallone (D-N.J.) and Rep. Kathy Castor (D-Fla.) in the State Dining
Room of the White House in Washington on Aug. 16, 2022. (Drew
Angerer/Getty Images)

Alarm bells sounded for Republicans after Democrats shot down an
amendment to the bill proposed by Sen. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) to protect
the working class from more audits. Crapo’s amendment stipulated that
none of the funds from the Inflation Reduction Act could be used to
audit taxpayers making under $400,000 a year. Still, all 50 Democrats
in the Senate voted against it.

Republicans on the House Ways and Means Committee said CBO calculated
the monetary impact of Crapo’s amendment. Calculations confirmed that
had lower- and middle-income taxpayers been protected by the
amendment, revenue in the Democrats’ bill would have been reduced by
at least $20 billion.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen attempted to clear up “misinformation”
about the bill in a letter to IRS Commissioner Charles P. Rettig. She
wrote new resources allocated to the IRS “shall not be used to
increase the share of small business or households below the $400,000
threshold that are audited relative to historical levels.”
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen testifies before the Senate Finance
Committee in Washington, on June 7, 2022. (Nicholas Kamm/AFP via Getty
Images)

However, her directive isn’t included in the bill, meaning it won’t
have the power of law. Tax experts and analysis from the nonpartisan
scorekeeper at the CBO indicate Yellen’s promise will likely be broken
if the IRS sticks to its income expectations.

“Again, this has no teeth behind it,” said Preston Brashers, a senior
tax policy analyst with the Heritage Foundation.

Brashers said it would take time for the audits to start rolling,
increasing as the tax agency adds tens of thousands of new agents.
Proponents of the bill say a large number of those 87,000 employees
will fill jobs lost through attrition, but Brashers said it appears
that the agency will almost double in size.

In a press release, Rep. Kevin Brady (R-Texas) estimated that the
Democrats’ bill would amount to 1.2 million new audits of taxpayers
per year. Over 710,000 of these audits would fall on Americans who
earn $75,000 a year or less.
House Ways and Means Minority Leader Kevin Brady (R-Texas) speaks
during a hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, on May 13, 2021. (Anna
Moneymaker/Getty Images)

“If you’re an American worker making $75,000 a year, you are 4x more
likely to see a tax hike from this bill than any tax relief at all.
You’re hitting middle class families directly and through higher
energy prices as well,” Brady wrote on the Ways and Means GOP Twitter
feed.
Audits of Least Resistance

Another taxpayer category likely to be audited more is rural,
low-income households claiming an Earned Income Tax Credit, according
to the IRS.

Those who claim the EITC credits often make mistakes or don’t
understand the rules, which makes auditing these returns low-hanging
fruit for the IRS because they don’t require many man hours. The
opposite is true of audits of wealthy families who can afford
accountants and lawyers.

A much larger number of returns claiming EITC credits are audited
compared to the wealthiest households. In 2019, the number of audits
of low-income families claiming the EITC credit compared to high
wealth audits of $10 million or more was 205 to 1.