The IRS 5 Year Plan

WASHINGTON—The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has released its five-year strategic plan for 2022 – 2026, laying out four major goals.

Those goals include:

• Service. “Provide quality and accessible services to enhance the taxpayer experience.”
• Enforcement. “Enforce the tax law fairly and efficiently to increase voluntary compliance and narrow the tax gap.”
• People. “Foster an inclusive, diverse and well-equipped workforce and strengthen relationships with external partners.”
• Transformation. “Transform IRS operations to become more resilient, agile and responsive to improve the taxpayer experience and narrow the tax gap.”

‘Important Progress’

“We also continued to make important progress in our compliance programs, with a particular focus on abusive tax shelters, including syndicated conservation easements and micro-captive insurance arrangements,” IRS Commissioner Chuck Rettig said in comments reported by Taxcontroversy360.com.

According to the report, the strategic plan vows an increased focus on noncompliant, high-income and high-wealth taxpayers, partnerships and large corporations, which the report asserts “make up a disproportionate share of the unpaid taxes.”

“The IRS intends to improve efforts to collect unpaid taxes with effective deterrence and enhanced enforcement capabilities,” Taxcontroversy360.com reported. “Employees will also have access to Enterprise Case Management, which will provide agents with the full history of a taxpayer, along with other tools to prevent and address noncompliance. The IRS also wants to reduce the burden on taxpayers by decreasing the time between filing returns and compliance issue resolution. Finally, the IRS plans to improve public confidence by promoting compliance through publicizing criminal prosecutions and civil enforcement efforts.”

ID’ing Fraud Schemes

Additionally, Taxcontroversy 360.com said the IRS announcement points to increasing efforts to proactively identify fraud schemes. Its Office of Fraud Enforcement is creating a new Virtual Currency Learning Academy for all IRS personnel—from beginners to experts—with training focused on cryptocurrencies, blockchain tracing, anti-money laundering compliance and Altcoins, Taxcontroversy360.com stated.