IRS DOES NOT WANT TO ‘UNDERMINE PUBLIC TRUST IN THE U.S. TAX SYSTEM’

It sent billions of dollars in refunds to identity thieves who filed fraudulent tax returns

It looks like the Internal Revenue Service has issued more than $5 billion in tax refunds to identity thieves for the 2011 tax year. The IRS predicts that identity thieves could receive another $21 billion in refunds over the next five years.

The thieves have been filing fraudulent tax returns by using the identity of dead persons, children and others who would not ordinarily file a tax return. The IRS claims that last year it uncovered 940,000 fraudulent returns seeking $6.5 billion in refunds. But it also estimates that it let another 1.5 million fraudulent cases slip through undetected.

The IRS is worried that sending billions of dollars in refunds to identity thieves could ‘undermine public trust in the U.S. tax system.’ They’ve got to be kidding! What public trust in the U.S. tax system?

Doesn’t the IRS know that a majority of citizens do not trust their government. And almost no one trusts the tax system. In fairness to the IRS, that humongous bureaucracy is not the problem – it’s the crazy, complicated and confusing tax system that’s the problem! The only people that do trust the tax system are the tax lawyers who are good at finding loopholes that will greatly reduce the tax liability of their wealthy clients.

Undermine public trust in the U.S. tax system? Now, that’s a real joke!