IRS & Star Trek
Corporations often have creative ways of having their employees unwind. You have to
admit – there is something that makes one smile when imagining the
effort and camaraderie involved in producing a Star Trek episode. Until
you get to the cost. There was $50,000 spent on the Star Trek and the
Cuban dance shuffle. Hmmm. Great for fitness, great for morale perhaps,
but not for promoting fiscal responsibility.
The conference took place in Anaheim for 2700 IRS personnel. This 2010 conference
reportedly cost $4 million. That’s taxpayer money. AND,
it’s not a corporation. Corporations have boards, stock owners,
investors and market watchers that micro-manage the bottom line.
This is the agency that is responsible for the enforcement of collection and
distribution, but was on the front line for sequester cuts. This is the
agency now being blamed for targeted abuse by singling out specific
organizations. This is the one agency that does put fear into those
that, by choice, break the law through increasingly more advanced
methods of tax avoidance. Unfortunately, the latter is required.
So what does all of this tell you? It’s very complicated. No one has done anything
wrong. People are working within the system. Let’s help them by
instituting a simpler tax system, removing the stress, making the
process more accountable and transparent and help transfer this human
talent pool to sectors that are more beneficial for America.
There’s not as many ‘bad’ people in the IRS as what the media is reporting. The entire
system needs scrapped – soon.
Imagine hearing JFK shouting “I believe that this nation should commit itself to
achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of producing a tax system
that effectively collects tax revenue and returns it to those in need,
in the most effective means possible.” Like any kid that lived through
the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo era – I believe in the impossible.
Mark Schuster, Partner
June 3, 2013
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