Republican Missouri Rep. Jason Smith pressed Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen during a hearing on Friday about President Joe Biden’s budget proposal to boost IRS funding.
Rep. Smith chairs the House Ways & Means Committee, which is responsible for taxation and welfare policy. Smith brought Yellen to testify about President Biden’s 2024 fiscal year budget proposal, including an additional $43.2 billion for the IRS. (RELATED: ‘The Most Difficult Economy I Have Dealt With In Over Four Decades’: Oklahomans Tell Congress About Struggles)
After Democrats handed the IRS an $80 billion raise last year, taxpayers are now asked in this budget to hand the IRS another $43.2 billion?
I have to ask: Is this a joke? pic.twitter.com/Ya1QHcv4rb
— Rep. Jason Smith (@RepJasonSmith) March 10, 2023
“After Democrats handed the IRS an $80 billion raise last year, taxpayers are now asked in this budget to hand the IRS another $43.2 billion? I have to ask: Is this a joke? After a two-year inflation crisis that has cost American workers more than two months of pay, families need every penny they can get. But they can’t even get their own refunds back because of the historic backlog at the IRS. And they can’t get through to a human being at the agency because of the terrible customer service,” Smith said in his opening remarks.
Yellen touted the $80 billion IRS funding increase passed as part of the Inflation Reduction Act in 2022. The funding is projected to add 87,000 IRS employees, based on a Treasury Department study.
“And our new investment in the IRS is already paying off. Taxpayers are getting drastically improved customer service this year. For example, we’ve answered hundreds of thousands more phone calls during this filing season than at this time last year,” Yellen testified.
Biden’s request for increased funding would give the agency a $14.1 billion budget for fiscal year 2024, an increase of 15%. Additionally, the IRS would receive $29.1 billion in funding for enforcement and operations.
IRS audits were primarily targeted at working class Americans in fiscal year 2022, a study by Syracuse University shows. Low-income wage-earners taking the Earned Income tax Credit (EITC) were five times more likely to be audited than every other group of taxpayers.