Usa accounts, after Musk’s cuts at risk 500 billion of tax revenues
The revenue expected by the IRS, the American Incocation Agency, could drop more than 10 by April 15, deadline for the tax return
The tax revenues of the United States could record a collapse of more than 10% by the deadline of April 15, the deadline for submitting the tax return. To launch the alarm is the Washington Postwhich reports data and testimonies collected by officials of the Treasury and Aternal Revenue Service Department (IRS). The forecast is based on non -public internal projections: compared to 5,100 billion dollars collected in 2024, the drop could exceed 500 billion dollars, with heavy consequences for the entire federal budget.
According to the sources cited by the newspaper controlled by the founder of Amazon Jeff Bezos, the drop in revenue is not attributable to macroeconomic factors or tax reforms, but it would be the direct result of changes in the behavior of taxpayers and, above all, of the profound cuts operated within the IRS by the Trump Administration. Over 11,000 employees of the Agency have already been fired, out of an expected total of almost 20,000, with particular impact on the divisions dedicated to assistance to the taxpayer and controls.
The internal staff of the IRS confirmed that numerous investigations on large companies and high -income taxpayers have been abandoned due to lack of resources. The president of the Compliance Division, Heather Maloy, has left the assignment in recent days. Since the beginning of Donald Trump’s new mandate, two IRS commissioners have resigned.
The result is a significant drop in effective collection. According to official data, the declarations presented dropped by 1.7% compared to the same period of 2024. But the internal projections of the IRS – based on models that take into account expected payments, partial budgets and historical levels of default – indicate a much wider flexion of the revenue actually collected.
To this is added a further worrying element: according to officials mentioned by Washington PosT, the online discussions of taxpayers intent on not paying taxes or exploiting credits and deductions improperly are increasing, betting on the fact that the agency will not have the tools to verify them.
The forecast has caught many surprise, also because in 2024 the US economy grew by 2.8%, and there were no relevant changes in tax legislation. Other factors, such as delays due to fires in the Los Angeles area or the choice of some taxpayers to postpone the declaration with semester extensions, could explain a part of the flexion. But they don’t justify such a marked drop.
The real fear concerns the effects on federal debt, today at 36,200 billion dollars. IRS collects over 95% of federal revenues. If the actual revenue collapses, and the congress does not cut the expense, the government will be forced to increase the debt.
According to a reserved document obtained by the post, the IRS leaders had warned the transition team of Trump already in January, illustrating in a presentation of 68 slides the possible effects of the cuts on the operation of the agency. In the document there was a gradual reduction of the staff, to be accompanied by a strong digitization of the processes. The message was clear: the IRS is a production system similar to an assembly line – if you halve the staff, also halve the result. And automation is not enough, at least not in the short term.
For now, the data also show a drop in the efficiency of the services: only 85% of the calls to the IRS receives response, against 93.6% of the same period of 2024. It is a signal of operational slowdown, in a year in which the American tax system shows the first visible cracks.
