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Don't Get Audited! The IRS's Dirty Dozen Red Flags

By Joy Taylor, assistant editor, The Kiplinger Tax Letter

Ever wonder why some tax returns get intense scrutiny from the Internal Revenue Service while most are ignored? The agency doesn't have enough personnel and resources to examine each and every tax return filed during a year -- it audits only slightly more than 1% of all individual returns annually.

Arlington, Va.—New Years is rapidly approaching, and with it come sweeping new regulations that could force tens of thousands of Americans out of work. Despite a federal lawsuit filed in March by three independent tax preparers and the Institute for Justice (IJ), the IRS remains committed to implementing an unprecedented licensing scheme. The new regulations benefit powerful industry insiders and burden some 350,000 independent tax-return preparers, ultimately harming 85 million taxpayers.

"In their appeal to the high court, his attorneys pointed to a psychological test conducted in 2004 that pegged Wilson's IQ at 61, below the generally accepted minimum competency standard of 70."

By Associated Press
January 09, 2010 6:49 AM

CONCORD, N.H. - A federal judge will decide whether a man convicted of amassing an arsenal of weapons at his Plainfield, N.H., home suffers from a delusional disorder that could affect his sentence.

Ed Brown's competency and sentencing hearing is set for Monday in U.S. District Court.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Internal Revenue Service is struggling with an aging workforce where more than a third of its executives are eligible for retirement, a scenario putting its mission at risk, a government report said on Monday.

H.R. 748: To require all persons in the United States between the ages of 18 and 25 to perform national service, either as a member of the uniformed services or as civilian service in a Federal, State, or local government program or with a community-based agency or community-based entity, to authorize the induction of persons in the uniformed services during wartime to meet end-strength requirements of the uniformed services, to provide for the registration of women under the Military Selective Service Act, and for other purposes.

New regulations from Department of Agriculture require that Americans that own four or more “breedable” female pets that are at least four months old must obtain a federal license and be subject to federal inspections, regardless of whether or not the owner is planning on breeding any of their pets. Animal rescue shelters fear that they may also suffer, as penalties could amount to $10,000 per day per animal.

Federal workers owed more than $3 billion in income taxes in 2008, according to the Internal Revenue Service, a figure down slightly from the year before.

The agency reported that 276,300 current and retired federal employees owed $3,042,200,000 in 2008, down from $3,586,784,725 in unpaid taxes in 2007. The list includes White House and Congressional staffers and current and former active-duty and reserve members of the military.

Republican Sen. Rand Paul may not have the clout in Congress to reach his goal of eliminating the Department of Education, but he can do a close second: shut down the Senate committee trying to pass sweeping new federal education legislation.