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Cuts in the IRS budget from $14 billion in 2010 to approximately $12 billion in 2017 have resulted in staff reductions by about one-third during that time frame, according to Glenn DiBenedetto, a CPA and director of tax planning at New England Investment and Retirement Group. “IRS staffing dropped to less than 10,000 agents for the first time since 1953,” he said.
As a result of the cuts, audit rates have dropped for all income groups, but at a much greater percentage for high-income earners, he explained. “Audits of people earning over $10 million dropped 52 percent between 2011 and 2017, according to ProPublica.”
A study by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University found a similarly steep drop in audits of millionaires; nevertheless, the audit rate for high earners — at 6.66 percent in 2018 — is much higher than the 0.59 percent overall rate for individual returns.
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