President-elect Obama said in his weekly radio address that he will be investing time and money in our infrastructure. The president-elect’s economic package will have five main components: making public buildings more energy efficient; investing in infrastructure on the order of the 1950s-era interstate highway system; upgrading school buildings; expanding broadband Internet access; and, making the health care industry more technologically advanced.
“We need action – and action now,” Obama said. “We won’t do it the old Washington way,” Obama said. “We won’t just throw money at the problem. We’ll measure progress by the reforms we make and the results we achieve – by the jobs we create, by the energy we save, by whether America is more competitive in the world.”
Readers of my blog know that I have been yammering for infrastructure planning for awhile now. Congrats and here is hoping that it starts to make a difference in the lives of people in our country. The results won’t be seen overnight but as long as the money is spent in America, with American companies and people who are living here are going to be able to work the jobs, we should be okay.
The dollar number for the proposed economic stimulus package is looking as of now to be between $400 billion to $700 billion dollars. Hopefully, that money will get down to where it is needed, in our pockets and purses so we can save and spend with it.
Remember that our President-elect also stated that the economy will get worse before it gets better. The question will be there, for how long will it be worse? Make sure you have savings and a decent job to weather the rough financial storm that we are trying to navigate through.
Also, here is a question from a reader: “How much money has the IRS collected from examinations and Levies and Liens? In other words, there isn’t much incentive for them to stop auditing us, is there?”
My answer, and I probably will go more into audit stuff in another blog, is you are right. Remember, the IRS is out to get people who aren’t paying what they should and there isn’t a reason they should stop audits, is there? If you knew you could just put down any amount of money and know that there weren’t any consequences you would do it right? Think really HARD before you answer that since we all know how human nature works.
To answer your question, I believe the IRS collected $23.5 billion dollars from examinations and $31.8 billion from Levies and Liens in 2007. I will try and get to more IRS statistics for you in the near future. They tend to be very sobering, if nothing else. Don’t be scared, just make sure you keep great records and if you aren’t doing your own tax research hire a good tax professional.
I am taking new clients, by the way.
Kim Isaac Greenblatt
Comments on President-elect Obama’s infrastructure plan and answering an audit money question.