I shared some charts that showed how IRS enforcement activity was changing over time and also some charts showing how “delinquent” taxpayer activity was changing over time.
The new IRS Data Book is out, so I can update the numbers. Breaking with recent trends, both seizures and levies were down , though there was another big jump in liens filed:
On the “delinquent” side, the number of people who didn’t pay their taxes when they were due held steady, and the number of people who didn’t file on time (or at all) dropped, but the IRS continued to to be overwhelmed by the backlog of delinquent cases and so the total unresolved delinquent accounts continued to rise:
The IRS wasted a lot of time and energy rolling out its private debt collection scheme, and now they’re going to have to waste a lot more time and energy unrolling it now that it’s been abolished. They lost enforcement manpower in the course of that experiment, too. They say they plan to beef up in that area, but this will take time and the rookies will need training, so I think we can expect them to continue to have problems with their enforcement backlog for a while.
