The IRS hung up on more than 8 million taxpayers this season


Not only does the IRS expect you to file your taxes on time, it expects you to do so without asking the agency for help.
Thanks to budget cuts, the IRS's phone system couldn't handle the millions of calls it received this tax season. The system hung up on more than eight million people calling about their taxes, and only 40 percent of callers reached a human at the IRS, The Associated Press reports. Of those who did get through, many of them were on hold for more than a half hour.
IRS Commissioner John Koskinen said Wednesday that the agency's budget has been reduced by $1.2 billion since 2010, which affected the phone system. Koskinen told AP that the IRS requested money for various projects in the past two years, but "Congress gave us zero dollars."
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Meghan DeMaria is a staff writer at TheWeek.com. She has previously worked for USA Today and Marie Claire.
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