I.R.S. Liens, Levies, Seizures Plunge in 2020

The IRS just released its latest Data Book, which gives us some statistics about another tax season. This means I can update my charts of how IRS enforcement activity — specifically liens, levies, and property seizures — has been changing over the years. In short, all three are at twenty-year lows:

the number of levies, liens, and property seizures dropped in 2020

Some of this is no doubt due to the temporary suspension of tax enforcement during the epidemic. Much is also due to the ongoing degradation of the IRS workforce and budget. (Plans to reverse that are currently creeping their way through Congress.)

In other news…

Hotels in Mar del Plata, Argentina announced a tax strike, saying that they cannot both pay their employees and their taxes while the tourist trade is lost to Covid.
Ruth Benn connects the dots between war tax resisters Max Sandin and Randy Kehler and the whistleblowing of Pentagon Papers revealer Daniel Ellsberg.
A research paper into tax resistance in Ivory Coast finds that it does not behave according to theory. For example, Ivorians who believe elected officials are corrupt and the government is opaque are no more or less likely to resist taxes than those who believe elected officials are honest and the government is open. A stronger sense of national identity corresponds to a greater enthusiasm for tax resistance there (which is the opposite of what is usually found). It goes to show that reality is complicated.
The human war on traffic ticket robots continues to rage, with the robot hordes taking casualties in France, Luxembourg, and Italy (more of the same). Tiny Luxembourg installed 24 such cameras five years ago, and more than half of them have been knocked out of service, while none of the human rebels have yet been caught.
A new war tax resistance season is culminating in Spain. The movement there is particularly active, with “tax resistance offices” counseling resisters in several cities during tax-filing season, and lots of coordination between war tax resisters, climate activists, border demilitarizers, and other such activists.