Grassroots Campaign Targets Plain Language at IRS: Potential to Recover Millions...

Grassroots Campaign Targets Plain Language at IRS: Potential to Recover
Millions of Tax Dollars

WASHINGTON, June 1 /PRNewswire/ -- PlainTaxTalk, a grassroots group announced
it has launched a campaign to urge the IRS to use plain language in all its
public documents and forms to help the average American taxpayer comply with
the tax laws.

"The idea behind our movement is simple," says the group's founder John
Klotsche, a former Senior Advisor to the IRS Commissioner, "vastly improve
American taxpayers understanding of their tax reporting responsibilities."

"The IRS needs to jettison its archaic habits of obfuscation and substandard
communication and embrace the principles of plain language, recognized as the
universal gold standard for all written communications," said Klotsche.

The 'tax gap' -- the taxes Americans owe but don't pay -- is estimated by the
IRS to be north of $300 billioneach year. Deliberate evasion causes some of
this but most results from unintentional behavior. This is because taxpayers
simply don't understand, or won't take the time to understand, their tax
responsibilities. For every 1% increase in tax compliance levels, tax revenues
would increase $20 billion.

"Plain language is much more than wordsmithing documents," said Klotsche. "It
is reader-focused writing that uses document design techniques to produce
clear and understandable information including planning the document,
designing it, organizing it and writing clear instructions using plain
English."

Tax simplification can come about legislatively, administratively, or both.
The Congress endlessly talks about doing something but never does. Will
Rogers' contemptuous quip is a reminder of this gridlock: "The difference
between death and taxes is death doesn't get worse every time Congress meets."
PlainTaxTalk would not bet the farm on a legislative fix and believes the IRS
should step forward and take the lead on tax simplification.

PlainTaxTalk believes the IRS should take the complicated mess the Congress
has created and using tested, modern-day plain language principles and
techniques tell the American taxpayers in simple, understandable words how to
go about quickly and accurately reporting their fair share of the taxes they
rightly owe. That's what PlainTaxTalk is all about--in plain language.

The cover article published today in Tax Notes magazine, PlainTaxTalk: The
Yellow Brick Road to Tax Simplification, presents the case for plain language
at the IRS. The group's Blog site at http://www.PlainTaxTalk.org provides a
forum for comment.

SOURCE PlainTaxTalk

Heather Maurer, for PlainTaxTalk, +1-202-862-7857, hlm@capdale.com