comment: >
  
  It's almost foundational to real reform that the current political system be fixed first. I think you're underestimating how quickly reform can be slammed through with sufficient political will, but nothing will get done while Republicans are obstructing government on principle and Democrats are too scared of their own shadow to risk "socialism".
context: "Yellen told Reuters that she was thrilled that Congress had approved $80 billion in new funding to help the agency reduce a huge backlog of tax returns and better hunt down $600 billion in unpaid tax bills." >
  
  Bad take >
  
  Don't worry I'll add the /s for them >
  
  "The law also includes about $270 billion in tax credits for electric vehicles, home solar panels and other climate purchases that will be overseen by Treasury, which has made Yellen a pivotal climate figure in President Joe Biden's administration." >
  
  
  $270 billion in tax credits for electric vehicles
  
  Great. Just what we needed, more donations to the wealthy. >
  
  An internal combustion engine creates greenhouse gases no matter who's driving it >
  
  Totally agree the current form of the IRS is a disaster.  Way to complicated and only benefits the rich and powerful. >
  
  can we just not have us all do our own taxes anymore it's annoying >
  
  *H&R Block and TurboTax have enter the chat*
  Congress: "SORRY? WHAT? I CAN'T HEAR YOU OVER THE SOUND OF ALL THESE MONEY CANNONS GOING OFF!" >
  
  It should be a failure of duty for them to target the poor over the rich just because it's easier for them >
  
  They don't "target" anyone. Lower income people getting audited more comes mostly from two things: lower income people are more likely to add things to their returns that get them flagged, and the IRS being underfunded for almost two decades has led to them not being able to hire/keep more highly trained agents that can process more complicated returns. However, even if you fix number two, number one will still mean they'll get audited more, just to a lesser extent. >
  
  I think “target” is an appropriate word here. Auditing poor people because you don’t have the agents or time to go after the complicated returns IS targeting. >
  
  They're not auditing "poor people" because of the lack agents. They're auditing them because it's their job. >
  
  I don’t understand why that is the default position. If a place is short staffed there are there are many places they can cut. How about cut audits equally? >
  
  It's not a matter of cutting audits, it's about having staff at that level that can do the work. Also, the IRS has been underfunded for a very long time and every department doesn't have enough people. That money that they just got is going to go everywhere in the agency. The media just likes to focus on audits to get people to click. >
  
  It's a lot easier to match 1099s and W2s than it is to audit a Schedule C or Schedule K or any other entity type return including a 1065, 1120 S or 1120 C. 
  A computer does the matching, then puts the discrepancies on the auditor's desk.
  The auditor follows up on the discrepancies.
  It's a matter of the matching program that forces the audit because the computer system keeps track of the matching.  The majority are people who only file these forms W2 or 1099.
  The other issue with automatic filing is the facts and circumstances that change for taxpayers, including who divorce and/or have children.
  Because of little or no broadband in many rural areas, many of these forms have to be paper filed.
  Also,  it's against some people's religion to use digital property. >
  
  
  Asked about the debate with Congress over raising the debt ceiling, Yellen simply puts her hand to her forehead and sighs.
  
  The House Republican circus is already off to a raucous start. Better buy aspirin in the big bottle. >
  
  I absolutely concur with Yellin. The tax code should be 5 pages or less. No tax write offs. Period.  Pay your fucking share; I don’t care if you’re a corporation or person. 
  Our institutions are failing the American citizens it supposedly governs.  This is the beginning of the collapse of the U.S. Empire.  We had a good run. >
  
  That wouldn't hurt my feelings. Could maybe start with not making millions of Americans do some of its work for it every year and penalizing some of them when they inevitably make a mistake. >
  
  I’d argue every government/ state / city department and institution we have needs to be restructured / rebuilt / streamlined all while being heavily audited. The budgets of so many departments are ridiculously overblown due to the fear of their allotments being the same, so they waste all money they have saved at the end of the term so they can get more (this has been happening for so long). >
  
  Our entire government needs a hammer taken to it's organizational structures. Pretty much the only thing that unambiguously works is probably the postal service, everything else is some flavor of shit show because of years of corruption or Republican maleficence. Even broadly functional organizations like the CDC need some reorganization when you get into their guts. >
  
  Yeah, the amount of work it would take is insane, plus you’d need overlap of administrations to make sure it happened correctly. It’s like a decade long project at minimum and that’s understating it, especially if you consider every state and city would have to fall in line. You’d need functional services, all while rebuilding them. As silly as it sounds, you’d probably need to create a new government department that could not be impeded on, by conflicting administrations.