People occasionally ask me which areas of tax administration worry me the most. There is certainly no shortage of candidates, but if I had to narrow it down, the IRS’s math and clerical error authority under IRC § 6213(b) and (g) would be right up there at the top of the list, along with the IRS correspondence examination program. In fact, I expressed my concerns about the IRS’s administration of its math error authority since my first Annual Report to Congress in 2001, when I was fresh from representing low income taxpayers as Executive Director of a Low Income Taxpayer Clinic. I’ve gone on to write, conduct research studies, and make legislative recommendations about math error authority in my Reports to Congress, as well as congressional testimony in 2011 and 2015. My past concerns take on new meaning, what with the current Administration’s budget proposal echoing the former Obama Administration’s call for the IRS to be granted “correctible error” authority. Read More