Total Value of Government Waste: $36,986,404,949

$8 Million PR Contract To Promote Obamacare  - $8,000,000

The Obama Administration is spending $8 million of taxpayer dollars to promote Obamacare.

Christie pushes back against NY Times, former ally

 Bailey Comment: " If Chris is the best choice for the 2016 GOP presidential candidate, the Republicans are in trouble."
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie fought back Saturday against new allegations regarding his involvement in the bridge-closing scandal, criticizing The New York Times and a former political ally-turned-accuser.
The embattled Republican governor defended himself in an email to friends and supporters in which he says former Port Authority of New York and New Jersey appointee David Wildstein “will do and say anything to save David Wildstein.”
The email -- titled “5 Things You Should Know About The Bombshell That's Not A Bombshell” -- was sent by the governor’s office and obtained by Fox News.
The scandal focused on the bridge closings of access lanes on the George Washington Bridge in September, causing massive traffic disruption. The closures appeared to be political retribution by Christie appointees at the Port Authority against a Democratic mayor who did not support Christie's successful 2013 re-election bid.
The New York Times story published Friday, based on a letter from Wildstein’s lawyer, suggested “evidence exists” that shows Christie knew about the lane closings, despite the governor vehemently and publicly saying he neither ordered them nor knew why others did.
The 5-point e-mail from Christie's office begins by targeting The Times, accusing the paper of shoddy reporting, subject to numerous corrections.
“A media firestorm was set off by sloppy reporting from the New York Times and (its) suggestion that there was actually ‘evidence’ when it was a letter alleging that ‘evidence exists,’ ” begins the email, obtained first by Politico.
The initial story said stated Wildstein in fact had evidence to prove Christie’s knowledge.
The email also argues that Wildstein, who has asked for immunity in the scandal, has past that includes people and newspaper accounts describing him as "tumultuous" and that he  created a “culture of fear” within the Port Authority.
Wildstein resigned in December after being sought for testimony by the Assembly committee investigating the lane closures.
Christie, a potential 2016 GOP presidential candidate, has been under attack by Democrats and others since revelations about the bridge closing surfaced, and was forced to hold a 2-hour-long news conference in January to deal with the scandal.

Welcome Illegals FREE STUFF

Islamic group once tied to terror trial received thousands in farm subsidies, without growing crops

Bailey Comment: "What the h***'s wrong with our government, and how are we going to fix it"? 


An Islamic organization once listed by the Justice Department as a co-conspirator in a high-profile terror case is among many groups that have received thousands in federal farm subsidies, without producing any crops. 
The subsidies to the North American Islamic Trust are just a slice of the questionable payments that, as has been well documented, go to millionaires and non-farmers every year. But as Congress moves to rein in the program, these subsidies stand out considering the group's involvement in the Holy Land Foundation case of 2008. During the trial, the group's farm subsidies stopped, only to be reinstated after a federal judge cleared them.
Records show that since 1998, the North American Islamic Trust has received over $10,000 across 34 separate taxpayer-funded programs. NAIT's two relatively small land plots are tax-zoned as "agricultural" -- but they aren't developed.
The group has been able to obtain farm subsidies legally without producing any crops because it is a nonprofit "charity group" landowner -- so it received subsidies on top of being tax-exempt.
"Organizations with no history in agriculture are getting in on taxpayer-provided farm subsidies," said Adam Andrzejewski, founder of the transparency database OpenTheBooks.com and former Republican candidate for governor of Illinois.
He said the NAIT's subsidies are "probably legal," adding: "The federal farm bill has become so large that it has nothing to do with 'preserving the family farm' or 'creating a stable food supply'."
The North American Islamic Trust's history is complicated -- as the offshoot of the Muslim Students Association and its financial arm, NAIT was founded in 1973 by Middle Eastern-born college students. The majority of NAIT's founders were members of the Muslim Brotherhood, and the group continues to be backed by Saudi Arabia. NAIT uses Shariah-approved investing with its own company, Allied Asset Advisors, to buy and pool mosques and community centers. Former Allied Asset Advisor board member, Jamal Said, preached the most conservative forms of Islam and was specifically named as a co-conspirator in the terror-funding case.
In the Holy Land Foundation case of 2008, which prosecuted investors charged with sending  money to Hamas, NAIT was named by U.S. federal prosecutors as a co-conspirator and an entity that is or was "a member of the Muslim Brotherhood" (the parent organization of Hamas).
The Holy Land Foundation's five accused individuals were sentenced for funneling $12.4 million to the terror group, which controls the Gaza Strip and is dedicated to the destruction of Israel. NAIT never was formally charged in the case.
NAIT's sheer size may have worked against it. An estimated one in five mosques in the United States is owned by NAIT; those properties are estimated to be worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Several of these mosques, though, have been places of worship for those convicted in terror activities.
But even before a verdict in the 2008 Holy Land Foundation case had been reached, NAIT appealed their co-conspirator status, saying that they had "suffered injuries" from a "public branding."
In October of 2010, the Fifth Circuit Court overturned the group's "co-conspirator" status after NAIT's appeal and pressure from the ACLU. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals said "if NAIT could have been accurately characterized as a joint venture," that "does not carry an inherently criminal connotation."
NAIT's farm subsidies stopped in 2008 during the trial and were first received again in 2011.
Every farm subsidy to the North American Islamic Trust has been received at the mailing address of the Islamic Center of Central Missouri Mosque, records show. The USDA lists the "farm location" as Boone County, Mo. But aerial searches of the "agricultural" properties owned by the North American Islamic Trust reveal that the plots are undeveloped, tree-dotted land combined to form just over 100 acres valued at about $59,000.
The North American Islamic Trust and the Islamic Center of Central Missouri did not reply to multiple requests for comment.
According to the USDA and OpentheBooks.com, about half of NAIT's subsidies were "Direct Payments," a program which costs taxpayers an annual $5 billion. By 2011, the North America Islamic Trust began obtaining subsidies under the auspice that it is a "church, charity, or non-profit organization."
The payment program in question, though, could be under the budget knife in the latest farm bill which passed through the House earlier this week.
The federal government began farm subsidies during the Great Depression, in part because farmers were producing surplus crops and could not sell to a struggling market. The total cost for farm pay-outs in 1995 was just over $8.1 billion, when planted farm acreage in the United States stood at roughly 260 million. By 2012, taxpayers were subsidizing farmers by nearly double when planted acreage had decreased by millions of acres.

The U.S. Government Waste List 2013

The Waste List: 66 Ways The U.S. Government Is Blowing Your Hard-Earned Money Submitted by Michael Snyder of The Economic Collapse blog,

Why did the U.S. government spend 2.6 million dollars to train Chinese prostitutes to drink responsibly?  Why did the U.S. government spend $175,587 "to determine if cocaine makes Japanese quail engage in sexually risky behavior"?  Why did the U.S. government spend nearly a million dollars on a new soccer field for detainees being held at Guantanamo Bay?  This week when I saw that the IRS was about to pay out 70 million dollars in bonuses to their employees and that the U.S. government was going to be leaving 7 billion dollars worth of military equipment behind in Afghanistan, it caused me to reflect on all of the other crazy ways that the government has been wasting our money in recent years.  So I decided to go back through my previous articles and put together a list.  I call it "The Waste List".
Even though our politicians insist that there is very little that can still be cut out of the budget, the truth is that the federal budget is absolutely drowning in pork.  The following are 66 crazy ways that the U.S. government is wasting your hard-earned money...
#1 The IRS is about to pay out 70 million dollars in bonuses to employees even though discretionary bonuses are supposed to be cancelled due to the sequester.
#2 According to the Washington Post, the U.S. government is going to leave 7 billion dollars worth of military equipment behind in Afghanistan.
#3 It is being projected that the trip that the Obamas will be making to Africa will cost U.S. taxpayers $100,000,000.
#4 The NIH plans to spend $509,840 on a study that "will send text messages in 'gay lingo' to methamphetamine addicts to try to persuade them to use fewer drugs and more condoms."
#5 The National Science Foundation has given $384,949 to Yale University to do a study on “Sexual Conflict, Social Behavior and the Evolution of Waterfowl Genitalia”.  Try not to laugh, but much of this research involves examining and measuring the reproductive organs of male ducks.
#6 The IRS spent $60,000 on a film parody of “Star Trek” and a film parody of “Gilligan’s Island”.  Internal Revenue Service employees were the actors in the two parodies, so as you can imagine the acting was really bad.
#7 The NIH has given $1.5 million to Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts to study why “three-quarters” of lesbians in the United States are overweight and why most gay males are not.
#8 The NIH has also spent $2.7 million to study why lesbians have more “vulnerability to hazardous drinking”.
#9 The U.S. government is giving sixteen F-16s and 200 Abrams tanks to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt even though the new president of Egypt, Mohammed Morsi (a member of the Muslim Brotherhood), constantly makes statements such as the following…

“Dear brothers, we must not forget to nurse our children and grandchildren on hatred towards those Zionists and Jews, and all those who support them”

#10 During 2012, the salaries of Barack Obama’s three climate change advisers combined came to a grand total of more than $370,000.
#11 Overall, 139 different White House staffers were making at least $100,000 during 2012, and there were 20 staffers that made the maximum of $172,200.
#12 Amazingly, U.S. taxpayers spend more than 1.4 billion dollars a year on the Obamas.  Meanwhile, British taxpayers only spend about 58 million dollars on the entire royal family.
#13 During 2012, $25,000 of federal money was spent on a promotional tour for the Alabama Watermelon Queen.
#14 The U.S. government spent $505,000 “to promote specialty hair and beauty products for cats and dogs” in 2012.
#15 NASA spends close to a million dollars a year developing a menu of food for a manned mission to Mars even though it is being projected that a manned mission to Mars is still decades away.
#16 During 2012, the federal government spent 15 million dollars to help the Russians recruit nuclear scientists.
#17 Over the past 15 years, a total of approximately $5.25 million has been spent on hair care services for the U.S. Senate.
#18 The U.S. government spent 27 million dollars to teach Moroccans how to design and make pottery in 2012.
#19 At a time when we have an epidemic of unemployment in the United States, the U.S. Department of Education is spending $1.3 million to “reduce linguistic, academic, and employment barriers for skilled and low-skilled immigrants and refugees, and to integrate them into the U.S. workforce and professions.”
#20 The federal government still sends about 20 million dollars a year to the surviving family members of veterans of World War I, even though World War I ended 94 years ago.
#21 The U.S. government is spending approximately 3.6 million dollars a year to support the lavish lifestyles of former presidents such as George W. Bush and Bill Clinton.
#22 During fiscal 2012, the National Science Foundation gave researchers at Purdue University $350,000.  They used part of that money to help fund a study that discovered that if golfers imagine that a hole is bigger it will help them with their putting.
#23 The U.S. government is giving hundreds of millions of dollars to the Palestinian Authority every single year.
#24 Federal agencies have purchased a total of approximately 2 billion rounds of ammunition over the past couple of years.  It is claimed that all of this ammunition is needed for “training purposes”.
#25 During 2012, the National Science Foundation spent $516,000 on the creation of a video game called “Prom Week” which apparently simulates “all the social interactions of the event.”
#26 If you can believe it, $10,000 of U.S. taxpayer money was actually used to purchase talking urinal cakes up in Michigan.
#27 When Joe Biden and his staff took a trip to London, the hotel bill cost U.S. taxpayers $459,388.65.
#28 Joe Biden and his staff also stopped in Paris for one night.  The hotel bill for that one night came to $585,000.50.
#29 If you can believe it, close to 15,000 retired federal employees are currently collecting federal pensions for life worth at least $100,000 annually.  That list includes such names as Newt Gingrich, Bob Dole, Trent Lott, Dick Gephardt and Dick Cheney.
#30 The U.S. Department of Agriculture has spent $300,000 to encourage Americans to eat caviar.
#31 The National Institutes of Health recently gave $666,905 to a group of researchers that is conducting a study on the benefits of watching reruns on television.
#32 The National Science Foundation has given 1.2 million dollars to a team of “scientists” that is spending part of that money on a study that is seeking to determine whether elderly Americans would benefit from playing World of Warcraft or not.
#33 The National Institutes of Health recently gave $548,731 to a team of researchers that concluded that those that drink heavily in their thirties also tend to feel more immature.
#34 The National Science Foundation recently spent $30,000 on a study to determine if “gaydar” actually exists.  This is the conclusion that the researchers reached at the end of the study….

“Gaydar is indeed real and… its accuracy is driven by sensitivity to individual facial features”

#35 In 2011, the National Institutes of Health spent $592,527 on a study that sought to figure out once and for all why chimpanzees throw poop.
#36 The National Institutes of Health has spent more than 5 million dollars on a website called Sexpulse that is targeted at “men who use the Internet to seek sex with men”.  According to Fox News, the website “includes pornographic images of homosexual sex as well as naked and scantily clad men” and features “a Space Invaders-style interactive game that uses a penis-shaped blaster to shoot down gay epithets.”
#37 The General Services Administration spent $822,751 on a “training conference” for 300 west coast employees at the M Resort and Casino in Las Vegas.  The following is how the Washington Post described some of the wasteful expenses that happened during this “conference”…

Among the “excessive, wasteful and in some cases impermissable” spending the inspector general documented: $5,600 for three semi-private catered in-room parties and $44 per person daily breakfasts; $75,000 for a “team-building” exercise — the goal was to build a bicycle; $146,000 on catered food and drinks; and $6,325 on commemorative coins in velvet boxes to reward all participants for their work on stimulus projects. The $31,208 “networking” reception featured a $19-per-person artisanal cheese display and $7,000 of sushi. At the conference’s closing-night dinner, employees received “yearbooks” with their pictures, at a cost of $8,130.

You can see some stunning pictures of GSA employees living the high life in Las Vegas right here.
#38 Do you remember when credit rating agency Egan Jones downgraded U.S. government debt from AA+ to AA?  Well, someone in the federal government apparently did not like that at all.  According to Zero Hedge, the SEC planned to file charges against Egan Jones for “misstatements” on a regulatory application with the SEC.
Normally, the SEC does not go after anyone.  After all, when is the last time a major banker went to prison?
No, the truth is that the SEC is usually just a huge waste of taxpayer money.  According to ABC News, one investigation found that 17 senior SEC officials had been regularly viewing pornography while at work.  While the American people were paying their salaries, this is what senior SEC officials were busy doing…

One senior attorney at SEC headquarters in Washington spent up to eight hours a day accessing Internet porn, according to the report, which has yet to be released. When he filled all the space on his government computer with pornographic images, he downloaded more to CDs and DVDs that accumulated in boxes in his offices.
An SEC accountant attempted to access porn websites 1,800 times in a two-week period and had 600 pornographic images on her computer hard drive.
Another SEC accountant used his SEC-issued computer to upload his own sexually explicit videos onto porn websites he joined.
And another SEC accountant attempted to access porn sites 16,000 times in a single month.

#39 According to InformationWeek, the federal government is spending “millions of dollars” to train Asian call center workers.
#40 If you can believe it, the federal government has actually spent $750,000 on a new soccer field for detainees held at Guantanamo Bay.
#41 The U.S. Agency for International Development spent 10 million dollars to create a version of “Sesame Street” for Pakistani television.
#42 The Obama administration has plans to spend between 16 and 20 million dollars to help students from Indonesia get master’s degrees.
#43 The National Science Foundation spent $198,000 on a University of California-Riverside study that explored “motivations, expectations and goal pursuit in social media.” One of the questions the study sought an answer to was the following: “Do unhappy people spend more time on Twitter or Facebook?”
#44 In 2011, $147,138 was given to the American Museum of Magic in Marshall, Michigan.  Their best magic trick is making U.S. taxpayer dollars disappear.
#45 The federal government recently spent $74,000 to help Michigan “increase awareness about the role Michigan plays in the production of trees and poinsettias.”
#46 In 2011, the federal government gave $550,000 toward the making of a documentary about how rock and roll contributed to the fall of the Soviet Union.
#47 The National Institutes of Health has contributed $55,382 toward a study of “hookah smoking habits” in the country of Jordan.
#48 The federal government gave $606,000 to researchers at Columbia University to study how heterosexuals use the Internet to find love.
#49 A total of $133,277 was recently given to the International Center for the History of Electronic Games for video game preservation.  The International Center for the History of Electronic Games says that it “collects, studies, and interprets video games, other electronic games, and related materials and the ways in which electronic games are changing how people play, learn, and connect with each other, including across boundaries of culture and geography.”
#50 The federal government has given approximately $3 million to researchers at the University of California at Irvine to fund their "research" into video games such as World of Warcraft.
#51 In 2011, the National Science Foundation gave one team of researchers $149,990 to create a video game called “RapidGuppy” for cell phones and other mobile devices.
#52 In 2011, $936,818 was spent developing an online soap opera entitled “Diary of a Single Mom”.  The show “chronicles the lives and challenges of three single mothers and their families trying to get ahead despite obstacles that all single mothers face, such as childcare, healthcare, education, and finances.”
#53 Last year, the federal government spent $96,000 to buy iPads for kindergarten students in Maine.
#54 The U.S. Postal Service once spent $13,500 for a single dinner at Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse.
#55 In 2011, the Air Force Academy completed work on an outdoor worship area for pagans and Wiccans.  The worship area consists of “a small Stonehenge-like circle of boulders with [a] propane fire pit” and it cost $51,474 to build.  The worship area is “for the handful of current or future cadets whose religions fall under the broad category of ‘Earth-based’, which includes Wiccans, druids and pagans.”  At this point, that only includes 3 current students at the Air Force Academy.
#56 The National Institutes of Health once gave researchers $400,000 to study why gay men in Argentina engage in risky sexual behavior when they are drunk.
#57 The National Institutes of Health once gave researchers $442,340 to study the behavior of male prostitutes in Vietnam.
#58 The National Institutes of Health once spent $800,000 in “stimulus funds” to study the impact of a “genital-washing program” on men in South Africa.
#59 The National Science Foundation recently spent $200,000 on a study that examined how voters react when politicians change their stances on climate change.
#60 The federal government recently spent $484,000 to help build a Mellow Mushroom pizzeria in Arlington, Texas.
#61 At this point, China is holding over a trillion dollars of U.S. government debt.  But that didn’t stop the United States from sending 17.8 million dollars in foreign aid to China in 2011.
#62 The U.S. Department of Agriculture gave the largest snack food maker in the world (PepsiCo Inc.) a total of 1.3 million dollars in corporate welfare that was used to help build "a Greek yogurt factory in New York."
#63 The National Science Foundation recently gave a whopping $697,177 to a New York City-based theater company to produce a musical about climate change.
#64 The federal government once shelled out $2.6 million to train Chinese prostitutes to drink responsibly.
#65 The U.S. Department of Agriculture once handed researchers at the University of New Hampshire $700,000 to study methane gas emissions from dairy cows.
#66 The federal government has spent $175,587 "to determine if cocaine makes Japanese quail engage in sexually risky behavior".

California spends $1.37M on ObamaCare web stream featuring Richard Simmons

Bailey Comment: Unbelievable!

Facing a $78 million budget shortfall, California’s ObamaCare exchange has spent $1.37 million to fund an outreach video featuring exercise guru Richard Simmons gyrating on the floor and hugging a contortionist who is kneeling with his buttocks in the air.
The “Tell a Friend — Get Covered” campaign by Covered California features other celebrities Olivia Wilde, comic Billy Eirchner, Fran Drescher and Tatyana Ali. The centerpiece of the effort was an eight-hour live web stream that ran on Jan. 16.
None of the celebrities were paid for their work, Covered California said.
State Sen. Ted Gaines, a Northern California Republican, fired off a terse letter to Covered California Director Peter Lee demanding to know why he would launch such a campaign at taxpayer expense. The exchange likely will face a $78 million shortfall during the next fiscal year, said Gaines, who is vice chairman of the Senate Standing Committee on Insurance.
He singled out the web stream for special scorn.

House GOP leaders back limited path to legal status for illegal immigrants

 Bailey Comment: GOP is now Caving in!

House Republican leaders on Thursday endorsed a limited path to legal status for some illegal immigrants, in a move Democrats said could open the door to a deal on comprehensive immigration legislation.
The position was included in a document released by party leaders during their annual retreat in Maryland. The "standards for immigration reform" document ruled out a special path to citizenship for illegal immigrants.
Instead, it said immigrants living here illegally could remain and live legally if they pass background checks, pay fines and back taxes, learn to speak English and understand U.S. civics, and can support themselves without access to welfare.
But GOP leaders made clear that border security must be improved first.
"None of this can happen before specific enforcement triggers have been implemented," the document said.
Nevertheless, Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., a big advocate for immigration legislation on the Senate side, said the announcement could smooth the way for a deal on legislation. The Senate passed an immigration bill last year.
"While these standards are certainly not everything we would agree with, they leave a real possibility that Democrats and Republicans, in both the House and Senate, can in some way come together and pass immigration reform that both sides can accept. It is a long, hard road but the door is open," he said.
The House GOP document is sure to meet resistance from some rank-and-file members, and skeptical Republicans on the Senate side.
In advance of the House Republican retreat, Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, the top Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, delivered a 30-page memo to all House Republicans challenging their expected stance.
Sessions told members of his party they must "end the lawlessness -- not surrender to it" -- and they must defend the legitimate interests of millions of struggling American workers.
In his memo, Sessions warned of the negative impact of the House immigration proposal on U.S. workers, taxpayers and the rule of law. His analysis said increasing the number of immigrants would hurt an already weak economy, lower wages and increase unemployment. He cited White House adviser Gene Sperling's comment earlier this month that the economy has three people looking for every job opening.
House Speaker John Boehner, in remarks obtained by Fox News, told Republican members Thursday that the guidelines they announced "are as far as we are willing to go."
"I have been clear that I oppose the massive, flawed immigration reform bill passed by the Democratic-controlled Senate. I've been clear that the House will not take it up or engage in negotiations with the Senate on it," he said. "We will address this issue in a step-by-step, common sense fashion that starts with securing our nation's borders and enforcing our nation's laws."
He added: "Nancy Pelosi said yesterday that for her caucus, it is a special path to citizenship or nothing. If Democrats insist on that, then we are not going to get anywhere this year."
Among the other planks of the House GOP "standards" was a statement that, "We must secure our borders now and verify that they are secure."
It called for a "zero tolerance policy" for illegal border crossers "when immigration reform is enacted."
The document also backed improving the system used to verify the immigration status of workers, and said the legal immigration system needs to be overhauled.
"Every year thousands of foreign nationals pursue degrees at America's colleges and universities, particularly in high skilled fields," the document said. "When visas aren't available, we end up exporting this labor and ingenuity to other countries. Visa and green card allocations need to reflect the needs of employers and the desire for these exceptional individuals to help to grow our economy."
The document opened the door to a temporary worker program, and, significantly, threw support behind a DREAM Act-style program. The Obama administration has already, on its own, allowed young illegal immigrants who came to the U.S. as children to stay in the country for now -- which is what the DREAM Act would have addressed.
The GOP document backed that goal, for those who meet certain criteria and either serve in the military or get a college degree. "It is time to provide an opportunity for legal residence and citizenship for those who were brought to this country as children through no fault of their own," it said.
The document also made clear that "criminal aliens, gang members and sex offenders" would not be able to seek legal status at all.

IRS customer service leaves millions of calls unanswered

Have a question on your tax returns? Don't ask the IRS. Bailey Comment : "Unless you owe them money"!
As tax day looms, an annual watchdog report to Congress finds that the agency is falling short when it comes to answering Americans' questions about the convoluted tax code.
The National Taxpayer Advocate found only 61 percent of people seeking to speak with a customer service representative last year got through to anybody -- leaving nearly 20 million calls unanswered.
The report largely blamed budget cuts, and lamented the impact the poor customer service is having on taxpayers.
"At the risk of vast understatement, it is a sad state of affairs when the government writes tax laws as complex as ours -- and then is unable to answer any questions beyond 'basic' ones from baffled citizens who are doing their best to comply," the report from National Taxpayer Advocate Nina Olson said.
The study detailed how customer service has steadily declined over the past several years, including at its 400 "walk-in sites." In fiscal 2014, the office said, the IRS will only answer "basic" questions at those sites during filing season. And it will not answer any questions, "even basic ones," after April, even for filers who got extensions.
"In addition, the IRS will discontinue its longstanding practice of preparing tax returns for low income, elderly and disabled taxpayers who seek help," the report said.
With the erosion in services, wait times have gone up. In fiscal 2004, callers were left on hold for just 2.6 minutes. Today, the average wait time is nearly 18 minutes.
Some taxpayers resort to writing letters to the IRS with their questions. The agency received 8.4 million such letters last year, but more than half were not answered by the end of fiscal 2013, the report said.
The problems stems in large part from budget cuts. The training budget has, according to the report, gone from $172 million a few years ago to $22 million. The workforce itself has fallen from 95,000 full-time workers to 87,000.
"Thus, the IRS not only has fewer employees than four years ago, but those who remain are less equipped to perform their jobs," the report said.
As the IRS is reluctant, like other agencies, to simply lay off employees in the face of budget cuts, it has targeted areas like training for cuts.