 It's time for the Long Jean Chronoscope a television journal of the important issues of the hour brought to you every Monday Wednesday and Friday a presentation of the Long Jean Wittner watch company maker of Long Jean the world's most honored watch and Wittner distinguished companion to the world honored Long Jean Good evening. This is Frank Knight may I introduce our co-editors for this edition of the Long Jean Chronoscope? They are CBS News Correspondents Larry Lisser and Walter Cronkite our distinguished guest for this evening is T. Coleman Andrews Commissioner of Internal Revenue As our guest tonight would be the first to admit nobody loves the tax collector but while the subject of taxes is always in the realm of politics the Job of mr. Andrews is to see that we pay no more or no less than we're obliged to do by law Mr.. Commissioner since the deadline for filing income tax returns is still a few days away Do you have any idea of how many people haven't filed yet? Well, no not exactly how many have not filed But we've been keeping in pretty close touch with it from time to time and Of course, we won't know until after the April 15th deadline has passed for individuals You know corporations passed on 15th of March Well, but we won't know until after that April 15th deadline has passed and we've studied the results and see what returns are filed in each Week of the filing period just exactly what the pattern is going to be We do know that a lot of people haven't filed yet who should have you do know that yes, we do know that but People are being people as they always are they they take an advantage of the opportunity which they were supposed to have Have another 30 days the only thing is that I think I should say to all those folks who haven't filed that These people that work in the revenue service really knock themselves out almost during the filing period and I Hope no one is going to think that I should Insist that those people work over time between now and April 15th and ought to take care of people who really could file More promptly and now Rather wait until the last minute well has the extension Mr. Andrews of the filing period for another month bit of any help to the Revenue service. Yes, it has it's been it's been a tremendous help to us as well as a good help to the taxpayer It's helped us in this way you see We have to keep in mind all times at all times what our two main problems are number one is to collect taxes and number two is to Get after those people who Inclined to hold back on us and those who though they don't hold back in reporting. Nevertheless, just don't like to pay taxes or any other belt now Anything that slows down those two efforts renders us inefficient So what we what we've been able to do with this extended filing period is to keep more of our people at their regular tasks and therefore we've been able to hold up Collections and hold up and in fact increase the number of examinations made of tax returns And we have to some extent gotten rid of that peak Does that mean mr. Andrews that more of us are going to get checked because of this extra month? We've been given it sure does you know, we've been on a program of building up our Auditing organization our examiners for Nearly 18 months now And we expect to go right on up to the point where we will probably have about twice as many field auditors as we had two years ago or 18 months ago and probably half again more Fraud investigators and we had at that time and I might say that with improved auditing methods and the increased force We expect to Examine four times as many returns with twice the number of people what percentage of the of the total number of people Putting in returns will get checked under that and I would you like to know that? Yeah Well, I tell you let me give it to you this way What is going to happen? What happens is this a great many people? Those returns don't have to be checked because their income is derived entirely from withholding And we know what that is and we know what tax they owe Then as we get on up the scale the the probability of being checked increases In proportion to the presence of a number of factors which we don't have time to go into so that I'll say this that As we increase our staff Examining staff and as we improve our methods The probability of anyone Not getting checked is diminishing very rapidly. Don't you get to a point where the cost of the Collecting of the taxes gives a diminishing return for the amount of taxes collected Oh, yes, there is a law of diminishing returns, but I'll say this we haven't reached that point yet And I'm not I haven't gone to worry about that. We'll cross that bridge when we get near it if I may say so Mr. Commissioner Some people think that the 1954 tax returns are extremely complicated I think one editorial said that they were the most complicated in the whole history of the income tax What do you think of that criticism? Well, would you like to me to say what I think of that particular statement? I Think that particular statement was made more to create a fact than it was to show any evidence of having really studied the situation and As far as that proposition generally is concerned though, you probably be interested to know that actually There has been relatively little criticism That the returns are more difficult than they have been in the past now There's only one good reason for that and that is that they aren't any more difficult than they've been in the past The exception of two schedules, you know, we now have a credit for dividends and a credit for retirement income well No one who's criticized those returns has suggested that we leave those those Calculations off of that return and no one is suggested in a better way to do it than we've provided Those are the only two things on that return that are essentially different from last year now, that's form 1040 That deals with the fellows fair-sized income men and women the 1040 a however Which is for the small taxpayer the man's income up to five thousand dollars who wants to take the standard deduction of 10% That's the simplest tax form or income tax form that anybody's ever seen Now that's not just my opinion Representatives of 85 different governments of the world that have been through our shop. Tell us that it's really the simplest thing that anybody's ever developed but the size of a check made on the card so it can be processed manually or By machine either one it asks certain very simple questions Questions that anybody can answer contains no calculations. We do all the work So really for about 35 million people, we've made the job a whole lot easier And we certainly haven't made it any more difficult for the rest of them except to the extent that we've had to provide A means of figuring some of the credits that Congress in this desire to give some relief Give them when they developed in 1954 way You ever try to figure out how much each investigator these new menu are talking about how much each Investigator should bring in in order to pay for his own salary and expenses. Well, we don't We don't figure how much he should bring in we figure how much he actually does Actually what happens is this we put a new man on and in the first year after he has Learned his job and that takes quite a few months to get him up to that point. He'll probably bring in 10 to 1 the next year He'll get up to maybe 20 to 1 and as he goes on he might even get to the point of of as much as 30 and 40 to 1 some of for instance of our top Investigators produce as much as a quarter of a million dollars of revenue a year and they only get paid about ten thousand dollars tops So you see that's 25 to one So what they bring in depends upon how good they are in other words, we don't concentrate We don't say to native you got to bring in so much money We say to him you got to be a good agent if he's a good agent the money comes as a matter of course you see any hope of Simplifying the amount of bookkeeping required by those in middle and higher income brackets particularly those who are Independent contractor so to speak professional man doctors lawyers and Radio announcers people like that to give you a very frank and soon know about let me explain a little bit on that The fact of the matter is that not nearly as many people keep the records they should As we would like to see as a matter of fact that said it over half of the people who should keep some kind of records don't Now then how can you simplify something for somebody who isn't already doing what he should be doing? And moreover you can't simplify the bookkeeping requirements of a tax law until you simplify the law itself but with that $20 Cut across the board have helped your problem any if it had gone through the Congress It would have played havoc with us administratively. We would have thrown us into the worst tailspin We've been and we've ever been into I don't believe it would have been administrative impossible for us to handle it Well since there are several days left for about two three million taxpayers I guess to file their returns mr. Andrews. Have you any advice to give them now? You know I do I have some advice to give them more in the form of a hope Please get down there and get the job over with them. Don't wait till the last minute because when that last minute arrives We just can't get to everybody that wants to be helped We have all kinds of facilities for helping everybody Provided they'll come at us with a reasonable spread of volume Not all at one time and we just can't do anything for those that don't show up on time Because after that is too late Incidentally mr. Andrews if a person asks for an extension on filing their return Is this an invitation for an investigation? No, sir, not at all. Thank you very much mr. Go and Andrews the commissioner of internal revenue. Thank you very much I'm delighted to have been here The opinions expressed on the loan gene chronoscope were those of the speakers the editorial board for this edition of the loan gene Chronoscope was Larry Lassur and Walter Cronkite Our distinguished guest was T. 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