Another Debt Limit Meeting, Another E-Filing Industry Player?
Today at the White House: A second debt limit meeting. President Biden will meet with four Congressional leaders on the debt limit before he heads to Japan for the 49th G7 summit. Staff for Biden and McCarthy have been negotiating how to allocate spending between defense and non-defense priorities.
The IRS has a prototype for e-filing taxes directly, could disrupt the tax-prep industry. The IRS and US Digital Service developed the program and it could be available as a pilot for a small group of taxpayers by January 2024, reports The Washington Post. The program would allow Americans to file their taxes digitally and free of charge. Such a federal system would be in direct competition with the commercial tax prep market, estimated to be worth $14.4 billion in 2023. About 90 percent of individual tax returns were filed digitally in 2022.
IRS working to correct unfairness in tax code enforcement. IRS Commissioner Daniel Werfel acknowledged yesterday that Black Americans face more audit scrutiny and said the IRS is considering changes to its case selection process to address discrimination in its enforcement. For example, he suggested the agency could base audits on “broader tax issues” instead of improperly claimed earned-income tax credits.
Tune in today at 11:00 am: “Raising Revenue from Corporations.” Join the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center and the University of North Carolina Tax Center to examine new taxes on US corporations. Keynote speaker Itai Grinberg, former deputy assistant secretary for multilateral negotiations at the US Treasury Department, will discuss the new global tax agreement for multinational corporation taxation reform. Learn more, register, and watch the virtual event here.
French tax authority seeks $2.7 billion in back taxes from French banks. Four banks had roles in dividend arbitrage strategies in which shareholders transferred stock for a short period to investors based abroad to avoid paying taxes on dividends. A French banking lobby has filed a lawsuit to force the taxing authority to clarify which strategies required payment of taxes.
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