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1 1 (April 10, 2018)

handle is hein.crs/govzex0001 and id is 1 raw text is: Internal Revenue Service Budget, FY2018 Overview The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) collects the vast share of the revenue needed to fund the federal government and enforces federal tax laws. In FY2017, the IRS processed 245.4 million returns and related documents for all federal taxes and collected $3.4 trillion in gross revenue. Appropriations account for nearly all of the funds available to the IRS for obligation. In FY2017, the most recent year for which enacted figures are available, 94% of those funds came from appropriations. The remainder consisted of reimbursements, offsetting collections, user fees, and unobligated balances from previous years. Under current law, the IRS may use these miscellaneous funds as it deems appropriate. They are expected to total an estimated $1.059 billion in FY2018. (Non-appropriated funds are not included in Table 1.) Historically, the agency's appropriations have been distributed among four accounts: taxpayer services, enforcement, operations support (OS), and business systems modernization (BSM). As shown in Table 1, enforcement is receiving 42.5% of the $11.431 billion in enacted IRS appropriations, followed by operations support (31.8%), taxpayer services (21.9%), the BSM program (1.0%), and an administrative provision (2.8%) in FY2018. Table I. Internal Revenue Service's FY2018 Budget Request and FY20 I 7 and FY20 18 Appropriations (millions of dollars) FY2017 FY2018 FY2018 Enacted Request Enacted Taxpayer Services $2,157 $2,212 $2,507 Enforcement 4,860 4,706 4,860 Operations 3,638 3,946 3,634 Support Business Systems 290 110 110 Modernization Administrative 290 - 320 Provision Total $11,235 $10,975 $11,431 Source: IRS's FY2018 Budget justification and joint Explanatory Statement for the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2018 (P.L. 115- 141). After being funded through several continuing resolutions during the first half of FY2018, the IRS received a final budget for the year when President Trump signed the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2018 (P.L. 115-141) on March 23, 2018. The act provides $196 million more in Updated April 10, 2018 appropriations than the IRS received in FY2017 (see Table 1). For FY2018, the Trump Administration requested $10.975 billion for the IRS, or 2.3% less than the amount enacted for FY2017 (see Table 1). According to the Treasury Department's justification for the budget request, it was built around three elements: (1) an increase of $220.0 million to maintain FY2017 operating levels, (2) a transfer of $179.4 million from the BSM account to the OS account to reduce the backlog of deferred computer software and hardware updates, and (3) a decrease of $459 million from cutbacks in staffing and other costs across all four accounts. The transfer was treated as both a program increase for OS and a program decrease for BSM, resulting in no net change in requested FY2018 appropriations from the enacted amount for FY2017. Moreover, under the budget request, the number of full-time employees at the IRS would total 71,035, or 5,797 fewer employees than the average number in FY2017. According to budget documents, the IRS planned to meet its FY2018 objectives by becoming more streamlined in its operations and relying more on user fees to meet critical needs. Individual Appropriation Accounts Taxpayer Services Funding for taxpayer services pays for the costs of helping taxpayers meet their tax obligations, producing tax forms and publications, processing tax returns and other documents, and providing taxpayer advocacy services. The Trump Administration's FY2018 budget request for the IRS allocated $2.212 billion to taxpayer services, or $55 million more than the enacted amount for FY2017. Of the requested amount, $600.7 million would have gone to pre- filing taxpayer assistance and education, and $1.612 billion to filing and account services. In addition, $6.5 million was to be set aside for the Tax Counseling for the Elderly program, $12.0 million for low-income taxpayer clinic grants, $15.0 million for matching grants under the Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program, and $206.0 million for the Taxpayer Advocate Service (TAS). P.L. 115-141 provides $2.507 billion for taxpayer services, in FY2018, or $295 million above the budget request. Of this amount, $9.9 million is set aside for the Tax Counseling for the Elderly program, $12.0 million for low- income taxpayer clinic grants, $15.0 million for VITA grants (available through the end of FY2019), and $206.0 million for TAS, $5.0 million of which must be used for identity theft casework. The act also requires the IRS to submit reports in FY2018 to the House and Senate Appropriations Committees on steps it is taking to combat taxpayer identity theft, improve toll-free telephone and in- https://crsreports.congressg

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