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Compilation of Legislative Recommendations to strengthen taxpayer rights and improve tax administration
There is no way to sugarcoat the year 2021 in tax administration: From the perspective of tens of millions of taxpayers, tax administration did not work for them.
Each year’s Annual Report to Congress identifies the ten most serious problems facing taxpayers and offers recommendations to fix them. These issues can affect taxpayers’ basic rights and the ways they pay taxes or receive refunds, even if they’re not involved in a dispute with the IRS. As your voice at the IRS, the National Taxpayer Advocate uses the Annual Report to elevate these problems and recommend solutions to Congress and the highest levels of the IRS.
To improve transparency regarding TAS’s advocacy activities, we include Highlights of TAS Successes Throughout the Past Year to spotlight some of TAS’s accomplishments.
Discussion of the ten federal tax issues most frequently litigated during the preceding year. The section on most litigated tax issues for the first time contains an analysis of substantially all cases petitioned in the Tax Court rather than simply decided cases, providing a much broader view of issues taxpayers bring to court.
The TAS Case Advocacy function is primarily responsible for direct contact with all types of taxpayers (including individuals, businesses, and tax exempt entities), their representatives, and congressional staff to resolve specific problems taxpayers are experiencing with the IRS. Information from these contacts and case results are vital to TAS’s statutory mission to propose changes in the IRS’s administrative practices to alleviate taxpayers’ problems and identify potential legislative changes to relieve such problems. This section of the report discusses how TAS fulfills its mission to assist taxpayers with their specific issues and concerns involving IRS systems and procedures.
