Talk:Internal Revenue Service

Flooding?

This is old and not very important. I think it should be removed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.148.217.40 (talk) 01:35, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

done Lionelt (talk) 09:42, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Crimes against the IRS

Shouldn't Joseph Stack and other attacks on the IRS be documented in this article? 70.29.210.242 (talk) 06:59, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

There is already a link to Tax protester (United States) in the navbox in the article. --Coolcaesar (talk) 05:27, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

I think the murder of an IRS employee by a person flying an airplane into an IRS office building has more importance than flooding in an IRS office building that did not kill or injure anybody. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.148.217.40 (talk) 01:04, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Does the U.S. Department of Justice have power of attorney to represent the IRS in federal court? Zylog79 (talk) 13:53, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

Dear Zylog79: You're confusing your legal terminology. The term "power of attorney" usually has nothing to do with representing someone -- as an attorney at law -- in court. The U.S. Department of Justice by law represents the government of the United States of America in federal court in federal tax cases (with exceptions). The Internal Revenue Service is designated as a "bureau" of the U.S. Department of the Treasury, a department of the government of the United States of America. So, in a federal tax matter, a lawyer -- a person licensed as an attorney at law (a person licensed to practice law) -- in the Department of Justice represents the Internal Revenue Service. The exception is in U.S. Tax Court, where the Commissioner of Internal Revenue (the head of the IRS) is represented by attorneys in the Office of Chief Counsel of the IRS.

By contrast, the term "power of attorney" is not used to describe the power of an attorney at law to practice law or represent someone in court. The term "power of attorney" means the power to act on behalf of someone else as an "attorney in fact,". An "attorney in fact" and an "attorney at law" are two different things. An attorney in fact is not a lawyer (unless he or she also happens to be licensed as a lawyer, as an attorney at law). Instead, an attorney in fact is a kind of "agent." For example, you could grant a friend a "power of attorney" to sign contract on your behalf. That person does not have to be a lawyer (an attorney at law) to do that.

Generally, you don't give someone a "power of attorney" to represent you in court. You simply retain or hire an attorney at law to represent you in court. Famspear (talk) 02:45, 9 September 2011 (UTC)

IRS founded in 1862

Congress collected taxes prior to 1862 and did not use the IRS. From the IRS website:

The roots of IRS go back to the Civil War when President Lincoln and Congress, in 1862, created the position of commissioner of Internal Revenue and enacted an income tax to pay war expenses.

http://www.irs.gov/irs/article/0,,id=149200,00.html I'm going to delete material not pertinent to IRS. Lionelt (talk) 09:41, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

I agree on Lionelt's point about deleting the non-pertinent material. This is an article specifically about the IRS, not about the history of tax collection in general, etc. Famspear (talk) 14:24, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

I tend to agree with both of you, but I think that by Lionelt deleting the material, the beginning of the history section has been left very awkward. Starting the Civil War section with "Tensions around the post-colonial tax system led directly ..." is completely out of context. Perhaps the prior history can be summed up in a sentence or two as a lead-in to the discussion of the founding of the IRS, or else a better start to section can be written. -- DS1953 ^talk 02:42, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

You can not state that the IRS was started in 1862, as it did not, it was merely an (unconstitutional) income tax over the Civil War. They can only claim the time back until 1918, when the tax was declared constitutional by the 16th Amendment, and the name was first used. This whole thing smacks of a government PR article than a proper encyclopedia article.Craxd (talk) 21:21, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Well, not exactly. The taxes from the Revenue Act 1862 were almost certainly constitutional. The Pollack case found some taxes from the Income Tax Act of 1894 unconstitutional. Key word is some - basically it said taxes on income from dividends, interest and property (rentals) were direct taxes and unapportioned and hence unconstitutional. It didn't say anything about income taxes in general being unconstitutional. The 16th amendment didn't so much as grant a new power as remove a limitation (that direct taxes must be apportioned) on an existing power. You could argue that the IRS has it's roots in the Office created by the 1862 law but that's about it. Ravensfire (talk) 22:16, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

IRS Template?

Is there an IRS template on Wikipedia that points to sections of IRS Code? Something similar to {{usc}}? — Timneu22 · talk 12:27, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

Budget

The article does not mention what the yearly cost/budget of the IRS is. Does anyone have this information, and if so, can they add it to the article? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.172.162.156 (talk) 04:36, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

I added an estimate based on data from the Office of Management and Budget of the Executive Office of the President: Over $12 billion for the IRS for fiscal year 2011. Famspear (talk) 05:13, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

Note: The statistics for what the IRS collects are for fiscal year 2006, while the statistics for what the IRS spends are for 2009 and 2011. Maybe this can be updated later to compare "apples to apples." Nevertheless, the current presentation at least gives a rough estimate: The cost to run the IRS is about a half of one percent of what the IRS collects ($12.6 billion divided by $2.2 trillion would be about 1/2 of one percent). Famspear (talk) 05:23, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

Question???? Are the rules and regulations for the Federal IRS the same in all 50 states ? OR do they vary from state to state? Justme16145 (talk) 17:59, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

The short answer is that the rules and regulations are the same in all states. Generally, U.S. federal agencies don't vary their regulations by state. There might be a few "effective" exceptions to that rule, but I know of none off the top of my head, if you mean something along the lines of "OK, here's the rule we're declaring for Montana, but we're declaring the rule to be different for Georgia."

The effect of federal tax laws can vary from state to state in the sense that in some cases, federal law looks to STATE law for the rule. For example, when the answer to a federal tax question depends on who owns a piece of property, state law on property ownership (which can vary from state to state) will often have an impact on the answer to the federal tax question. But that's not a situation where the federal tax regulation itself is "different" from one state to another. It's the state laws that are different.

There are a few federal tax statutes or regulations that EFFECTIVELY apply differently in different states because of circumstances. For example, there were special rules after Hurricane Katrina, which rules affected people affected by the storm. Since the vast majority of people affected were in Louisiana, you could say that the effect of the federal tax laws or regulations benefited people more disproportionately in Louisiana than in, say, North Dakota. Famspear (talk) 05:50, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

CARRY OVER DEDUCTIONS FRO 1 YEAR TO TE NEXT WHAT ARE THEY

1. WHAT TAX DEDUCTIONS ARE AQLLOW TO CARRY OVER TO NEXT YEAR? 2.EMAILS [email protected] 3. HOW DO I FIND OUT TAX INFO? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.60.222.201 (talk) 08:27, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Just go to www.IRS.gov and look it up. This forum is not the place for tax advice. Geraldshields11 (talk) 14:58, 4 June 2012 (UTC)

IRS program to audit wealthy slammed

A small headline of page B1 of the April 11, 2012 USA today hardcopy - can't find it on the web. It talks about an IRS program to focus auditning on returns of American with incomes in the tens of millions. Ir says so far only 36 audits have been completed since 2009 out of 8,274. Anyone? Ottawahitech (talk) 20:01, 11 April 2012 (UTC) Ottawahitech (talk) 20:04, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

I found this related article on the web http://www.usatoday.com/money/perfi/taxes/story/2012-01-06/IRS-audits/52411620/1 Ottawahitech (talk) 20:04, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

EXCESS TO PERSONAL TAX INFROMATION FOR PUBLICK

WHO IN THE GOVERMENT HAS EXCESS TO TAX INFORMATION ON ANY TAX PAYER? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.246.75.30 (talk) 12:40, 5 September 2012 (UTC)

Lots of personnel at the Internal Revenue Service have access to tax information on taxpayers generally. There are legal restrictions on how personnel may look at personal tax information. The rules on that are voluminous and complex. Famspear (talk) 02:07, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Lots of history missing

The 16th amendment gets passed, then *nothing happens for sixty years* till Nixon's return gets leaked? There were two World Wars and a police action in that time...how did the IRS support the troops, as one example of interesting history. IRS and ccomputers. IRS and civil rights. There must be more! --Wtshymanski (talk) 20:24, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

There's more than that missing, especially about the start of Federal Reserve, and the end to the Great Depression around 1939, and through WWII.Craxd (talk) 21:25, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Contractors

Braulio Castillo is the president and chief executive officer of Strong Castle, a Service-Disabled, Veteran-Owned Small Business (SDVOSB) and a Minority Owned Small Business that has been providing information technology solutions to commercial and government clients since 1994. Until 2012, the firm was known as Signet Computers, Incorporated. Within months of the name change, the firm had hundreds of millions of dollars worth of government contracts, mostly with the Internal Revenue Service.

IRS during Prohibition?

Wouldn't IRS' activities during the Prohibition merit a section of its own, or at least a mention? According to the article Prohibition in the United States, one of three federal authorities responsible for enforcing Prohibition was the US Treasury Department IRS Bureau of Prohibition. A section on Prohibition could include a reference to the IRS' famous role in convicting Al Capone for income tax evasion.

Mojowiha (talk) 14:56, 4 August 2013 (UTC)