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Comment by Spooky23 | Hacker News Reader

The congress has been starving IRS of funding to reduce their effectiveness at tax collection. So it's not shocking that environment would create a situation where this type of systemic failure would occur.

A guy I know worked for an IRS regional office in an enforcement/audit role for something like 40 years. He had something like 75 co-workers in that role in 1999 and retired with 8. Technology actually increased their workload, but with less people, they only targeted the most egregious violations.

He stuck around because he was really passionate & dedicated to his work. He was a guru on some very specific/arcane areas and wanted to transition it to somebody. That never panned out, so he gave up and left when his health declined.

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So it's not shocking that environment would create a situation where this type of systemic failure would occur.

The IRS budget is $10 billion/year[0]. Is that enough money to expect decent security? If not, what is? Are we allowed to demand security from smaller organizations, or only from Google-sized or larger?

If we expect small businesses to protect our information, it's not too much to ask for the same from a $10b/year government department.

0. http://www.politico.com/story/2015/06/gop-irs-budget-118835....

The way Federal budgeting works, congress appropriates money for specific purposes. They've had something like $1B in operations funding cut over a 2-3 year period.

The politicians love to hand wave about "big government" and "do something" about the evil IRS. But actual simplification of the tax code would cost their political patrons too much money, so they make it easier for folks to break the law.

Findings from a GAO report this year: http://www.accountingweb.com/tax/irs/gao-report-links-irs-pr...

The actual report: http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-14-298

Also, John Oliver's segment regarding this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nn_Zln_4pA8

And Time's article backing it up: http://time.com/money/3819382/john-oliver-and-irs-tax-gap/

How relevant is funding level to an organization's ability to secure its data? Some very large and well-funded companies have been hacked, and it seems to me that many of the properties of our technology that allow security breaches are independent of funding---security is hard, whether rich or poor.

I get that quality of IRS work falls with less staff, but on the other hand - maybe it is a good thing? May be it will force changes? While not the worst in the world, USA tax code is... complicated. Maybe it could be simplified.

There's a balance. I think for a system to work, it needs to be fair. If the rules suck, change the rules.

But by implicitly ignoring the rules through inattention, except when you don't, it creates a perception of corruption and arbitrary behavior.

current system appears to work as long as you pump people into system to do work.

I don't see how defunding the IRS does anything but promote a Greece style economy which will rapidly spiral out of control.

Congress is responsible for simplifying it. Defunding the IRS still has no impact on it.

The IRS has no say in the tax code. Their only job is to enforce the law as it is currently written. If you want the tax code to change, talk to your Congressman.

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