Taxpayers’ trust of the Internal Revenue Service has dropped from 2020, according to a survey conducted in the fall of 2021. At the same time, trust in the agency’s ability to fairly enforce tax laws dropped to 66 percent from 72 percent..Conducted between September 30 and October 30 last year, results of the Comprehensive Taxpayer Attitude Survey 2021 included 1,029 telephone responses and 1,070 online responses.
Although a majority of Americans trust the agency to help them understand tax obligations—66 percent—the number who completely disagree with that belief increased to 14 percent in 2021, up from 10 percent for 2020. A third of respondents completely or totally disagreed with the statement that the IRS can be trusted in this regard.
There was also a significant rise in the number of respondents who believe the IRS spends too much of its resources to enforcement and not enough to customer service. Only 39 percent feel it keeps a proper balance.
