WASHINGTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Today Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) released its April 2017 WasteWatcher, a monthly dispatch to members of the news media, highlighting some of the most prominent fiscal issues affecting American taxpayers. The stories from its April edition of WasteWatcher are listed in part as follows:
Wasteful
IRS Program Fails to Prevent Tax Fraud
By Sean Kennedy
The
least favorite government agency during the month of April is the
Internal Revenue Service (IRS). Now taxpayers can add another reason to
the list of complaints about the IRS and the tax code. A program
intended to uncover and prevent the filing of fraudulent tax returns has
failed to perform as expected. Full story here.
Free
File Should Remain Free
By Deborah Collier
The
well-established and popular Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Free File
program, which provides taxpayers that make under $64,000 annually with
an option of 12 tax preparation companies to file their taxes at no
cost, is under attack. Full story here.
Venture
Capital for College Students
By William M. Christian
To
get the gist of an “income share agreement” (ISA), look no further than
the title of Kim Clark’s November 16, 2016 article in Money
magazine: “Now You Can Sell Shares in Yourself to Pay for College.” Full
story here.
NFL
Hits the Taxpayer-Funding Jackpot in Vegas
By Curtis Kalin
Las
Vegas has long been known as “Sin City,” and it will soon be home to one
of the worst fiscal sins of all time. Full story here.
A
Dopey Policy
By Elizabeth Wright
As states fall all
over each other to legalize recreational marijuana, barriers are being
erected that are making it increasingly difficult for people who want to
move away from smoking cigarettes, which are legal, to a safer product,
which is also legal. Full story here.
Step
Back, Doors Closing: D.C.’s Subway Debacle
By Rachel Cole
The
Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA), first ran its
trains in 1976. It started out positively, but the system has fallen
from grace after years of poor service and intermittent reliability, not
to mention several fatal incidents, and riders are leaving the service
at increasing rates. Full story here.
FedRAMP
Gets a ReVAMP
By Deborah Collier
The need to modernize
federal information technology (IT) is being taken seriously by the
Trump administration. This much-needed and welcome focus on federal IT
must include a close examination of cloud solutions, particularly as
they relate to the Federal Risk Assessment Management Program (FedRAMP). Full
story here.
Maryland's
Boondoggle Inn
By Andrew Nehring
In July 2016,
Frederick County (Maryland) Executive Jan Gardner introduced a bill that
would increase the county’s hotel tax from 3 percent to 5 percent to
fund certain aspects of a planned $84 million Downtown Frederick Hotel
and Conference Center. Full story here.
CAGW is the nation’s largest nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to eliminating waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement in government.
