The original draft of this letter to the editor was submitted to the Wall Street Journal in response to a published letter by former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers who supports the Biden administration’s desire to put the IRS on steroids so it can perform many more tax audits than it does now and, at least in theory, close the “tax gap” by collecting more taxes from no-good, conniving rich people. The LTE was also copied to Mr. Summers who, now safely sequestered in an Ivory Tower at Harvard, has seemingly forgotten about IRS abuses of power and the resulting “trust gap.”
To the Editor:
Even if former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers accurately cites IRS data showing “nearly 15% of taxes owed are not paid,” readers needn’t agree that borrowing and printing “$40 billion to recruit and train revenue agents to police sophisticated tax evasion “with more audits is the proper policy response (“Larry Summers Responds on the ‘Tax Gap’,” Letters, July 3).
First, Mr. Summers conveniently forgets recent partisan abuses of IRS authority, both by Lois Lerner and her conservative speech-stifling henchmen during the Obama administration and subsequent leaks to the media of supposedly confidential taxpayer information by still unnamed and unprosecuted bureaucrats bent on advancing the Democrats’ political agenda.
But even more salient is the commonsense truth that our monstrously complex, society-engineering tax code is the principal driver of “sophisticated tax evasion.” Mr. Summers should read the late former corporate CEO and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s playful but pointed 2015 letter to the IRS, published by the Journal the same day (“Notable & Quotable: Donald Rumsfeld on Known Unknowns at the IRS“).
Referring to the joint return and payment he and his wife had just submitted, Mr. Rumsfeld wrote, “…I have absolutely no idea whether [they] are accurate. I say that despite the fact that I am a college graduate and I try hard to make sure our tax returns are accurate.”
If Mr. Summers wants to make a truly useful contribution to the “tax-gap” debate, he can use his senior statesman status to fight for a wholesale simplification of the tax code. Never-ran-anything-but-their-mouths eggheads and unionized elements of an ever-growing administrative state shouldn’t be incentivizing economic and social behaviors they prefer, nor should they be left to play God with citizens’ sensitive information. If we move toward the proverbial postcard-size tax return for everyone, there’ll be less tax evasion and more dynamic economic growth to lift all boats.
Darren McKinney, Washington, D.C.