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Internal Revenue Service: Assessment of the 2008 Budget Request and an Update of 2007 Performance

GAO-07-719T Published: May 09, 2007. Publicly Released: May 09, 2007.
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Highlights

The Internal Revenue Service's (IRS) budget request shows how IRS intends to balance spending for enforcement and taxpayer service, including spending for new initiatives and the Business Systems Modernization (BSM) program. A combination of enforcement and taxpayer service promotes compliance with the tax laws. GAO was asked to (1) compare IRS's proposed FY 2008 budget to prior years' and assess how the new spending initiatives are justified, and (2) describe IRS's enforcement, filing season, and BSM performance. GAO analyses are based on IRS's 2008 budget submission, supplementary IRS data, interviews with IRS officials, and prior GAO reports. Some of GAO's analyses have been reported earlier this year and updated here.

Recommendations

Recommendations for Executive Action

Agency Affected Recommendation Status
Internal Revenue Service The Commissioner of Internal Revenue should have available basic descriptive, cost, and expected performance information on the spending initiatives proposed in the 2008 budget submission to the extent to such information has not been provided.
Closed – Not Implemented
In their comments on the testimony, IRS officials reported they could not provide additional descriptive information on the agency's new initiatives other than what was included in the FY 2008 budget proposal.
Internal Revenue Service The Commissioner of Internal Revenue should include in future budget submissions, basic descriptive, cost, and performance information on new spending initiatives, with supplementary documentation available if needed.
Closed – Implemented
IRS's FY 2009 budget proposal included basic descriptive, cost, and expected performance information on all new initiatives. The budget request generally has more informative justifications than for FY 2008, and has sections explicitly entitled, for instance, "initiative summary," "implementation plan," "expected benefits," and "ROI."

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Topics

Budget outlaysFuture budget projectionsIncome taxesInternal controlsPerformance appraisalStrategic planningTax administrationTax lawTaxesTaxpayersVoluntary complianceBudget requestsTax gap