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The 10-year spending plan aims to bring a long underfunded and overwhelmed agency into the 21st century.
After months of anticipation, small businesses now have a glimpse of what a revamped Internal Revenue Service could look like as the agency begins to transition to a digital-first approach.
The IRS on Thursday released its $80-billion plan to begin the agency’s modernization efforts, which will introduce new digital tools, streamline tax processes, and offer more assistance to taxpayers. Some of the improvements will be gradually introduced over the next 10 years, though the IRS has highlighted that it will focus on getting rid of its paper backlog in the first five years. This is a key issue for the agency: The IRS kicked off 2022 with an unprocessed paper backlog of 11.5 million returns, almost a third of which were original business returns.
The earmarked funds stem from the Inflation Reduction Act and will help the IRS transact with taxpayers more efficiently. As part of that focus on efficiency, the agency has committed to quickly fix taxpayer issues as they emerge — which is pretty noteworthy, says former IRS commissioner Mark Everson.
“This objective is good news for all taxpayers, but particularly for small businesses, who want to be treated fairly by the IRS but don’t want unresolved tax issues hanging over them like a sword of Damocles,” says Everson, who is now the vice chairman at Alliantgroup, a Houston-based tax consulting firm.
About Mark W. Everson
The Honorable Mark W. Everson was the nation’s 46th Commissioner of Internal Revenue Service serving from 2003 until 2007. Prior to joining the IRS, Everson held Bush administration posts as Deputy Director for Management at the Office of Management and Budget and Controller of the Office of Federal Financial Management. Everson also served in the Reagan administration, holding several positions at the United States Information Agency and the Department of Justice, where his assignments included Deputy Commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service. At the state level, Everson oversaw the Indiana Workforce and Unemployment Insurance Systems under Governor Mitch Daniels.
