Michael Cohn

The Internal Revenue Service ramped up its use of liens, levies and seizures last year in an effort to close the tax gap, pressuring taxpayers trying to cope with the economic downturn.

President Obama has been pushing to extend the 2-percentage-point cut in the payroll tax through next year, but this is one tax cut that his opponents in Congress may not agree to allow.

Standard & Poor’s decision to downgrade the credit rating for U.S. debt could put new pressure on the members of the so-called “super committee” in Congress to agree on tax reforms.

Despite the debt limit deal that Democrats and Republicans in Congress managed to hammer out at the 11th hour this week, the U.S. Treasury is still facing the threat of a credit rating downgrade.

As the battle continues in Washington over how to avert a default on the government’s debt obligations, the possibility of imminent tax increases seems to be fading.

The so-called “cut, cap and balance plan” legislation that passed the House would require the passage of a Balanced Budget Amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would mandate a two-thirds supermajority to approve any future tax increases.

Georges Marciano, the co-founder of jean maker Guess?, Inc., recently lost his bid in a federal court to force the Internal Revenue Service to audit his tax returns.

Officials from the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board are heading to China later this month to meet with officials there to try to resolve the growing problems with audits of U.S.-listed Chinese companies.

U.S.-based multinational corporations and their lobbyists are pushing hard for a so-called “tax holiday” that would repatriate the earnings from their foreign subsidiaries, arguing that it would inject up to $1 trillion into the U.S. economy, but the prospects for job growth are murky at best.

At a recent hearing before the Senate Appropriations Committee, IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman heard from senators that the agency ought to provide taxpayers with its own free online tax software.

The Senate vote Tuesday on repealing the Volumetric Ethanol Excise Tax Credit failed, but it could be a sign of things to come as the tax reform debate heats up in the midst of talks to raise the debt limit.

A funny thing has been happening with the $7,500 plug-in electric vehicle tax credits that GM has been dangling before prospective buyers of its Chevrolet Volt: In many cases dealers rather than customers have been getting the tax breaks.

An agreement to raise the debt ceiling in Congress appears to be linked increasingly to a deal to cut both taxes and Medicare spending.

The American Institute of CPAs held its annual ritual this week of visiting lawmakers’ offices on Capitol Hill to press the case for tax simplification, a ban on tax patent strategies, changes in tax-filing due dates, and other legislative priorities.

The Internal Revenue Service has begun sending letters to political donors asking why they didn’t report their 2008 donations on their gift tax forms.

The Financial Accounting Standards Board appears to be once again on the slow path to convergence with International Financial Reporting Standards, but it will probably get there in the end.

The tax-related talk in Washington lately has shifted from overall tax reform to specific fixes like eliminating about $4 billion in tax breaks for major oil companies.

The eleventh-hour budget deal struck by the White House with Republican and Democratic congressional leaders to avert a government shutdown over the weekend depends to a large extent upon some accounting sleight of hand to achieve the claim of $38 billion in spending cuts.

As Washington moves closer to the brink of a federal government shutdown, the battle lines are already being set for the next budget turf war.

General Electric is a company that has long been known for innovation going back to the days of founder Thomas Alva Edison, but now some of its greatest innovations may be in the way it avoids paying corporate income taxes.