A Taxing Time

by Melanie White

I'm sure you've heard that people fear public speaking more than they fear death. What you probably haven't heard is that being audited by the IRS runs a close third.

Why do these IRS hooligans call themselves auditors? Did you know that the word audit comes from a Latin root meaning "to hear"? Yeah, right, like these people actually want to hear anything you have to say. It's more like, "We're right; you're wrong; give us your money." Forget auditors, they should call themselves wives.

They just can't wait to catch you lying--and yes, I'm referring to both auditors and wives. Both get some kind of perverse pleasure from catching people lying. I think it has something to do with watching others squirm.Of course husbands make it worse by seeing how far they can push their wives. I know that my husband believes, "Why tell the truth when a lie will do just as good--and sometimes even better." But I digress. I was talking about auditors.

These slime balls realize that most people lie about their incomes. People tell the IRS that they make less money than they actually do, and they tell everybody else that they make more. It's an epidemic sweeping the nation. It's called the "I'm Poor But I'm Richer Than You" syndrome.

As a stop-gap measure, auditors have taken to averaging the "I should be on welfare" figure and the "I'm a distant relative of Warren Buffet" amounts together to reach a happy medium over easy. I think lying about your taxes is only fair. The government lies to us about taxes all the time. They say they're going to give us a break, and cut taxes but then they raise taxes instead. It seems our founding fathers had to backwards. It should have been "no representation without taxation."

With all the new bills facing Congress every day, it's no wonder that taxes are so high. What really surprises me is that the IRS gives any refunds at all. It's a wonder that they don't keep all our money and figure we'll owe it to them sooner or later.

Usually the people who wait until the last minute to file their income taxes are the ones who know they're going to have to pay. They just don't know how much. So they're already in a bad mood. Then they have to find their receipts, corroborate their expense stories, and sort through a pile of complicated forms in order to figure out just how much they owe.

And when it's all said and done, sometimes you find that you just don't have the money to pay the grim reaper come tax time. The best way to deal with the IRS at a time like this is to use the installment plan. You stall for more time, and you stall for more money. I've even worked out a system that I particularly like. I pay quarterly. I give the IRS 25 cents every three months. Unfortunately this payment plan doesn't make much of a dent in what I owe them at the end of the year.

Also, when you think about it, April 15th has to be the worst day of the year to have a birthday. I know some people complain about having a birthday on Christmas because their birthday presents get mixed up with their Christmas presents, but at least everybody is in a good mood on December 25th.

In fact, I once knew a boy who was born on April 15th. His parents named him "Deduction." His relatives never gave him anything other than IOUs for birthday presents. But his uncle is the worst. Uncle Sam is the greediest relative he's ever had. If nothing else, having a birthday on April 15th would teach you one thing: the best things in live are tax-free.