IRS Spent $60,000 Producing Star Trek Parody 280
An anonymous reader writes According to the AP, the IRS is being "scolded for spending $60,000 dollars on an elaborate parody video that played at a 2010 conference. 'The video features an elaborate set depicting the control room, or bridge, of the spaceship featured in the hit TV show. IRS workers portray the characters, including one who plays Mr. Spock, complete with fake hair and pointed ears. The production value is high even though the acting is what one might expect from a bunch of tax collectors. In the video, the spaceship is approaching the planet 'Notax,' where alien identity theft appears to be a problem.' You can find the hilarious and/or nausea-inducing video on YouTube."
Our Tax Dollars (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, this is better than some of the things our government spends our tax dollars on...
Re:Our Tax Dollars (Score:5, Funny)
Like the F-35?
It can't even go to warp.
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True, still, I would love to have an F-35. I promise to not use it for evil. :-}
Re:Our Tax Dollars (Score:5, Funny)
Which F-35? The imaginary Navy one, or the imaginary Army one, or the imaginary Air Force one, or the imaginary combined version, or the imaginary one that won't kill the pilot due to mechanical and electrical failures?
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Apparently some people don't get parody of parody. Humor isn't universal. *shrug*
I just want to say: (Score:2)
"I wish they were dead, Jim"
Re:Our Tax Dollars (Score:5, Funny)
This is beginning to sound parroty
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Since the Army does not own or operated fixed wing combat aircraft, that is the only portion which is based on fact.
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You have been misinformed. http://defensetech.org/2012/04/13/army-wants-to-replace-c-12-fleet/ [defensetech.org]
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You have been misinformed. http://defensetech.org/2012/04/13/army-wants-to-replace-c-12-fleet/ [defensetech.org]
Yeah, the C-12 is not a combat aircraft, it's a transport aircraft. Carrying cargo does not count as combat, no matter what kind of cargo it is carrying (not unless the cargo is dropped midflight, and is explosive, in which case it's a "bomber", and not cargo but a payload). Combat aricraft are aircraft that engage in combat, and the Army is forbidden to operate any (the Air Force considers that their job). In fact, you can see the list of aircraft they do operate here [wikipedia.org].
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Not a combat aircraft. Cargo and recon.
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Like the F-35?
It can't even go to warp.
Sure it can. It just can't do it while it is in the Earth's atmosphere.
Only if you put it in the storage/shuttle bay of a warp-capable vessel, though.
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It's not the money (Score:3)
It's that they created something so horrific, and unleashed it on the internet.
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No, no, that is brilliant. They had me at the Vulcan's bin bag hair.
Re:Our Tax Dollars (Score:5, Funny)
Well, this is better than some of the things our government spends our tax dollars on...
I agree. Make Star Trek parodies, not war!
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Not by the IRS, it wasn't.
Foreclosure happens when you can't pay the mortgage holder. The IRS has nothing to do with it.
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While the parent used the incorrect term, what the IRS is capable of is functionally equivalent. The IRS has the legal authority to make liens, garnish wages, and seize assets for failure to pay income tax. So they could certainly take that farm away.
Re:Our Tax Dollars (Score:5, Informative)
Liens, yes. Seizing a primary residence is almost unheard of now, except in the case of tax fraud. Back in the day this was common, but reform in the 80s changed the rules.
"I can't afford it" will get you liens, garnishment and a payment plan but not your primary residence taken.
"Income tax is Unconstitutional, I refuse to pay" is a whole 'nother story. Better supply your own lube."
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Actually in most cases delinquent taxes can attach to your property in the form of a tax lien.
Once attached it becomes just as much a liability secured by your home as a regular mortgage.
After that
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The IRS doesn't levy taxes. Congress does.
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The IRS will attach a tax lien on the priory. If/when the property is sold, the lien comes of the top. They no longer have the right to force a tax sale on your primary residence.
Second house, cars, boats, etc yes. Primary residence pretty much no, except in the case of tax fraud.
Re:2010: 84,475,933 income tax payers (Score:5, Insightful)
For instance the 2009 Iraq war spending ($95.5B) was about $1.13 per tax paying household. On the other hand, the 2010 $521 billion cost of Medicare was funded by grabbing $6167.43 on average from each tax paying household.
Score -1 Major math fail.
95 billion is about 1/6th of 520 billion. Therefore Iraq costs 1/6th the Medicare budget based on your figures.
Your figures say that there are about 90 billion households in the u.s. based on your iraq figures of 95 billion / $1.1
I guess you have deliberately confused millions with billions to try to make a political point. Your figures should probably say iraq cost $1100 per household in one year.
Wrong... (Score:5, Insightful)
They spent all that money, and they still couldn't get the right uniforms.
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And no skirts on Uhura and Yeoman!
Re:Wrong... (Score:5, Interesting)
The porno version had that problem as well.
Re:Wrong... (Score:4, Funny)
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How is that a different definition? The correct way to use it would be "I've already spent my per diem." The "for the day" implied by the term itself
To be fair, it's often the case in the real world that a "per diem" payment is calculated and payed out in blocks of time other than one day. I've received per diem payments that were for time periods measured in days, weeks, and months.
I simply received a corporate check for the amount. I could have used it at any rate I wished, whether spending it all the first day or the last day or however I saw fit.
Temporary monthly housing per diem payments for extended-length temporary travel jobs and contract work c
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VALUE! (Score:2)
IRS Spent $60,000 Producing Star Trek Parody
Analysis shows it's best value for their (our) money they've gotten in years.
A manufactured controversy (Score:5, Insightful)
The IRS decided to produce videos in house instead of spending more money to hire outside contractors. Before they could start producing actual videos for use in training, public information, etc., they had to get up to speed with using their new video production facility. They had to make some dummy video during that checkout/internal training phase, so they chose to make parodies of Star Trek and Gilligan's Island. Big deal.
Re:A manufactured controversy (Score:5, Insightful)
Additionally as regards this: "The video features an elaborate set depicting the control room, or bridge, of the spaceship featured in the hit TV show."
Except it's pretty obviously green screen.
Re:A manufactured controversy (Score:5, Interesting)
The low-information voters in the Republican base don't care about the truth, they want to reinforce their faith that the government is wasteful and can do no right.
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Did I say that?
The point is that said voters want to be told that OMG GUMMINT WASTED TONS OF MONEY ON BUILDING A STAR TREK BRIDGE FOR NO REASON, because it makes them feel better about their irrational hatred of the government, truth be damned.
Re:A manufactured controversy (Score:5, Informative)
The point is it's obviously been misrepresented. $60K wasn't spent on making this film. There was no expensive set. Just a few cheap costumes from a costume store.
An earlier posts suggests that actually the $60K was spent on creating a production facility. And making this movie was just a byproduct of the training. That sounds more likely.
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3576059&cid=43258781 [slashdot.org]
Of course if you're one of those people for whom everything the government does is wrong, you'll choose to believe the worst regardless of the truth.
Re:A manufactured controversy (Score:5, Funny)
Could you keep going for a bit in that vein? I've almost got my Libertarian Talking-Points Bingo card filled out, you see.
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Additionally as regards this: "The video features an elaborate set depicting the control room, or bridge, of the spaceship featured in the hit TV show."
Except it's pretty obviously green screen.
So they're making a big deal of cosmetic differences that have no actual impact? Kinda like "assualt rifles" then, eh?
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Re:A manufactured controversy (Score:4, Insightful)
According to TFA, 1) Congress complained about the video and 2) the IRS admitted it was a mistake to make the video. If they just needed to produce a dummy video, and the Star Trek theme involved spending no money over what they would have spent anyway, why would they then announce that "There is no mistaking that this video did not reflect the best stewardship of resources"?
(Moreover, according to TFA, Congress did determine that the Gilligan's Island one was legitimate, so it's not as if they were doing a witchhunt and would refuse to accept any video with a TV show theme. If this video too was legitimate the IRS should have had no problems explaining it away. Obviously they couldn't.)
Looks like the Republicans are right, after all.
720p : I love how they include the HD Option (Score:2)
First, like many have stated, this video could be done for ~ around $1,000 USD for the same production quality and add an additional $200 USD could have been better.... but what caught my mind is how they uploaded it upscaled at quality that would look crappy even on a 2" screen.
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Re:720p : I love how they include the HD Option (Score:5, Informative)
$1,000? Let's say you pay minimum wage to the actors for a day of shooting.
5 actors * 10 hours * $8 = $400
Camera rental = $200 (Minimum)
Light rental = $100 (Minimum)
Greenscreen 20' = $100
Whoops we've used up your $1,000 budget and we still don't have:
An editor ($150 minimum)
No sound (Add another $100)
No poorly done 3D animation (Another $100)
You didn't pay a camera operator to setup and point your camera (Another $150 minimum)
Now you need to include the time for someone to "write" it. Probably would take a day. Another $150 minimum even if your employee was working for minimum wage.
Are you going to shoot in a room at the IRS? You have to account for your Janitor then clearing the room of furniture. Let's say $50 for 2 hours work. Still cheaper by a factor of 10 or more than renting a stage.
Oh yeah, the actors have to wear something. Add $60 per actor * 7 actors = $420
________
$2,120.
Also that $30k per video number is meaningless since it includes setting up a whole new in-house studio, stage space, purchasing lights, buying computers etc. If they produced 30 videos (1 per week) for the rest of the year, every video next year would be saving tax payers money.
Well, (Score:3)
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I watched it. All I learned is that there would anarchy without the IRS. They of course failed to mention that for every dollar spent on doing something useful for the country, three or four get spent on cronies or war.
The guy playing the captain... (Score:5, Funny)
had a good screen presence. With a little training, he might be as good as William Shatner.
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"With a little training, he might be as bad as William Shatner.|
There, fixed that for ya!
Good PR (Score:5, Interesting)
Look at the Star Trek cosplay, not the firearms we're stocking up [fbo.gov] on!
(not that it's much compared to the DHS)
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Nice choice. Those should make quite an impression.
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designated as the only shotguns authorized for IRS duty based on compatibility with IRS existing shotgun inventory
I'm not sure what's more interesting; that the IRS has an existing shotgun inventory, or that these are merely the only authorized shotguns in their arsenal. Either way, if they really want teeth, they should go into lobbying congress.
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I highly doubt those shotguns have 14 inch barrels.
It's obviously a naval version.
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I highly doubt those shotguns have 14 inch barrels.
Why would you doubt that?
It's a direct quote from the GSA request for bids.
And the minimum barrel length mostly just applies to normal folk. Law enforcement can get stuff that's restricted for most folk, or at least, we need to get the right special permits for. If it requires custom work, what do they care? It's government money.
(may not be custom, I don't know if there are standard 14" law-enforcement barrels, there may be)
I'm sure an 18.5" barrel just would not be tacti-cool enough for our IRS lads, wh
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It's the anti-Star Trek (Score:2)
The captain is Black, the comm officer is Caucasian... but she's... still... Uhura??? I'm mostly finding this funny. Like WTF is the Enterprise? Is that some kind of book that IRS people would recognize?
There is a chance, however remote, that if we tweet this link enough the IRS will get enough views on YouTube the recoup costs and make a profit to help pay on the order 1*10e-10 percent of the debt. I'll get on it right away captain...
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And it's still more faithful to Star Trek than that J.J. Abrams abomination.
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And it's still more faithful to Star Trek than that J.J. Abrams abomination.
You're entitled to your opinion. Personally I preferred the J.J. Abrams version over all of the STTNG movies and series. In STTNG they adhered to the Prime Directive like it was a religion and relied on diplomacy and technology to solve all problems. At least with the J. J. Abrams version, we have a crew that knows that sometimes you need to break the rules, more like the original Star Trek series.
Other Uses for Your Tax Dollars (Score:2, Informative)
They FAA is shutting down 149 control towers [soopermexican.com], supposedly as part of saving $637 million due to the sequester, at the same time Obama is asking for $500 million for the corrupt oligarchy running the Palestinian Authority.
But they still seem to be able to fund the TSA's security theater. But you know who won't have to go through the grope lines? People from Saudi Arabia. [judicialwatch.org] You know, the country that produced produced 15 of the 19 9/11 hijackers.
And of course, there are the billions in green crony subsidies [cronychronicles.org].
Your
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The funny thing is, if they wont miss those towers during the sequestration then why do they need them at all?
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I'm a Global Entry member. If you and your idiotic right wing mouth foamers bothered spending 2 seconds actually reading what Global Entry is--you would realize it doesn't let you bypass any security. The only thing you get as a Global Entry member is that you don't have to talk to customs and you can use a kiosk instead of talking to a customs agent.
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Same production values, waaaay less $$$ (Score:2, Informative)
If even one of the production crew had been a real Trekkie with half a clue, they could have contacted James Cawley and the Phase II/New Voyages crew and rented their elaborate sets and maybe even their assistance for a fraction of what it cost them... AND it would've had dramatically better production values.
IRS simply needs to increase the number of videos (Score:4, Funny)
The cost of the video is so high because they haven't achieved a scale of production. We need them to produce entire series of Star Trek, then IRS Voyager, Next Generation Income Tax... then Star Wars, Mission Impossible, etc If enough auditors spend enough time producing enough of these videos, the cost per video will go down, which means the "rate of increase" of IRS spending on videos could go down.
At least until the auditing period for the 1040 I'm working on today is expired. Then pull the plug.
It was funny !!!! (Score:2, Interesting)
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I admit to grinning a couple of times. I'd rate it a 5 for youtube flicks.
copyright (Score:2)
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I doubt the MPAA's lawyers ever want to even let the IRS know they exist, much less bring that kind of notice on themselves. I can see a bunch of IRS agents going through their books with a fine tooth comb. Actually I'd love to see it.
$60K on Licensing (Score:2)
Since the production value of that parody equals that of a silly cat video, it would be more convincing if majority of that money was spent on Viacom copyright license. Instead of risking violation of copyright law by invoking "Fair Use", legal cost alone may have made it worth $60K.
60 K is so small it isn't even roundoff error (Score:3, Insightful)
The US govt budget in 2012 is, roughly, 3.5 trillion dollars
That is 3.5 e12
And congress upset about 6e4 ???
simple math: assume there are 200 working days per year.
IF congress investigated the ever popular waste fraud and abuse every single day, how much would they have to save each day, to equal 1% of the budget ?
well, the answer is
step one 3.5e12/100 = 3.5e10
step two 3.5e10/200 = 1.75e8
That is, if congress found *one hundred and seventy five million dollars of waste, EVRY SINGLE DAY, it would be 1% of the us budget.
tell me again why we are even thinking about 60K ???????
$350,000 for the Congressional Barbershop (Score:2, Insightful)
Don't pay attention to that. Pay attention to the practice productions of their new in house training video program that will hopefully end up saving money instead of contracting it out.
also a Gilligan's Island video (Score:2)
There was also a Gilligan's Island video which so far the IRS has kept private. [thehill.com]
umm (Score:2)
that was taxing to watch.\]
It's just a training video (Score:3, Insightful)
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Good point (Score:2)
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Well, i'ts highly doubtful that they used anything close to 60K in cash. It'd be interesting to see what the *marginal* costs of the video were, Probably nowhere near 60K.
Cost in a large organization isn't the cash you shell out to do a thing; it also includes a share of the costs needed to be *able* to do a thing. Let's say that you make a movie at a marginal cost of $0. You then charge the $0 project a share of the cost of the movie-making infrastructure.
Spock's Fault (Score:3)
The video is a public service reminder to itemize your deductions or get stuck paying the bill for stuff like this.
Misunderstanding accountants (Score:2)
They did paperwork for $60 000 of expenses.
No chance that that was what they spent.
Tax people are familiar with the difference.
Re:Not even a drop in the bucket (Score:4, Informative)
Yeah, have we seen the US's military contracts and cost overruns [motherjones.com]? Shit, I'm glad they only spent $60k on this!
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A full bucket is full of drops.
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Re:Who gives a shit? (Score:5, Insightful)
Assuming you have an unlimited amount of time, yes.
But in reality, making mountains out of molehills is a clever form of filibuster. It gives you a "tough" image even while you distract debate from the real mountains.
I had a great mayor but... he was like you (Score:2)
My mayor squandered most his time in office distracted by small problems - his enemies created small BS distractions and his OCD did him in. Plus side is some jerks were fed up and quit and he fired some people -- all needed it; but again, it was largely inconsequentially small.
Re:Who gives a shit? (Score:4, Insightful)
It's all about the mindset. When you think of it as play money instead of money that people have sweated to earn and might otherwise be used for medical procedures, safer environments for children or otherwise improving quality of life, you get this kind of thing happening and it's symptomatic of a much bigger problem.
Re:Who gives a shit? (Score:4)
It depends on the purpose of the video. Was it a fun and engaging way for the employees involved to familiarize themselves with the process of making videos (before making regular training videos), if so it was money well spent.
Was it something to lighten up the mood and engage the participents at the start of the training conference? If so it was probably worth it.
Was it just play money for the involved employees? If so it was probably wasted, but I don't think that was the objective.
The fact they found a way to make part of their job enjoyable doesn't mean it was a waste.
Re:Who gives a shit? (Score:5, Insightful)
My girlfriend works at a library. A patron throw a hissy fit the other day because she thought they had used way to much salt on the sidewalk (this is snow country) and threatened to call the Mayor.
It costs about $1500 per day to run that library branch. Yet people freak out because they might use $1 more salt than necessary once a month to keep the City from being sued by somebody slipping and falling. This is how people think.
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Second, it's your attitude is part of the problem of why the deficit is so large and why so many people are in debt up to their eyes.
Oh, it's just 60k here, 80k there, 20k for this and that. Every department takes the same attitude in every office and when you add them all up you get millions and hundreds of millions wasted over the months and millions add up to billions over
Re:Who gives a shit? (Score:5, Insightful)
Sorry, 60K really is a tiny amount of money for a government agency. Maybe the video was a bad idea. Maybe it was a morale booster. Maybe it distracted thousands of employees from their miserable pay checks. I don't care. The money wastage in the government is the multi-billion dollar unnecessary, or overdone projects (TSA, F35, etc), not a few tens of K spent here and there on entertainment for thousands of people.
If your income is low, then you are right, the $2 coffees add up. If you are making payments on a $20M house, and traveling by biz-jet, then coffee is not the place to try to save money.
Companies often spend money to entertain or motivate their employees. They do this because sometimes the morale boost is worth far more than what it costs.
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Besides, people who are greatly outraged by this are probably the same sorts who think the government should be run like a business.
Since large (and even mid-sized) corporations drop $60,000+ on videos like this all the time (that's really not excessively expensive for this sort of thing) you'd think they'd be OK with this.
Re:Who gives a shit? (Score:5, Interesting)
Right - what has the government done for us.... (insert monty python quote here)
education , sanitation, roads, police,
Seriously, try to imagine what the US would be like without a government, or if people had to pay specifically for the services they wanted. You may not like the police but would you prefer Blackwater hiring out as private security? No public education for the poor? Private roads closed to non-members? No water systems? It would be a hell on earth - a scaled up Somalia.
Sure, there is out of control government spending but its a lot better than no government at all.
Re:Who gives a shit? (Score:5, Insightful)
Incidentally,
You may not like the police but would you prefer Blackwater hiring out as private security?
My neighborhood - and this is a normal, non-gated, houses $150-$200k neighborhood - has a private security force that patrols part time, because the police won't do their job. It is far from the only one like it.
No public education for the poor?
Setting aside the larger question of whether or not they actually educate those poor people, are publicly owned and operated schools staffed with government employees the only way we can think of to provide education to the general public? All my education tax money goes down the drain - my city's schools are unusably bad; I never spent a day in them, and neither will my children. My wife did work in the administration of the local school system before we married, and it firmly convinced her that the entire operation was a complete waste.
Private roads closed to non-members?
You mean like the NY, NJ, PA, OH, IN, and IL turnpike systems? The Dulles toll road? There are plenty of roads you have to pay to use, and yes, they were often privately owned and maintained in the early days of the country.
No water systems?
I guess you've never seen rural areas where water is in fact often supplied by a cooperative owned by the people who receive it? Even here in a city, where the incredibly disruptive nature of water and sewer services mean that they're always going to be provided by government (too hard to get permission to tear up all the streets otherwise), we pay for our water just like we pay for natural gas or electricity - fee for service.
I'm not an anarchist, but acknowledging that we have to have some government is not carte blanche for said government to waste other people's money, and if you sometimes sound like the crazy old guy complaining over the cost of paperclips used by the city, that doesn't mean it's always a bad idea.
Re:Who gives a shit? (Score:5, Interesting)
The three largest expenses of the US Federal government are Social Security, Healthcare and the military. If defense was handled at the state level it would be difficult to prevent some states being free-riders, particularly land-locked states. Healthcare and social security could possibly be handled at the state level but the costs would still exist and would result in a great deal of duplication. Also, big business would love to be able to play individual states off against eachother for the best tax deal. It would be a very different country - in fact each state would operate much more like an individual country with all the potential for internal conflict that that entails.
This doesn't excuse waste, but it is extremely naive to think that large corporations are intrinsically any less wasteful and bureaucratic than government departments once they achieve a certain size.
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All of those are local and state matters and should be paid for by local and state taxes. The IRS collects federal income tax.
I think the US would be a whole lot better off with a much smaller federal government, leaving more to state and local control a
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You can't use those observations to justify current levels of government spending. The US became the world's only superpower and got the largest economy on the planet when taxes were lower and the role of the federal government was much smaller. For a few decades, we have been entering a phase of decline, analogous to the decline of the formerly powerful European empires, and roughly for the same reasons.
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First, if you think $60,000. is just a little bit of money, you have been out of the real world for too long where ever you are.
I work in TV / Film production. In the real world.
I've also produced off-air promo reels before - which is basically what the IRS tried to do here. You have no idea how much this sort of thing costs.
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Do less.
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Hmm... Sounds like we don't need that department. Eliminating it will save all that paperwork.
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s/fans/funders/
Many corporations do. (Score:5, Informative)
Somebody needs to work on their reading comprehension skills:
Q Why does the IRS even have a film studio? ...to make training films and informational videos for taxpayers.
A
If you'd even browsed you'd find out that they have one for training videos because they found out they could do them cheaper in house than farming them out. It's not too surprising if you have either (a) a large number of videos to produce or (b) in-house technical staff with surplus time. I suspect (a) is correct as the congress changes tax law - Every Fucking Year - and all of the agents need to be retrained. Sending in-person trainers is even more expensive.
You'd be surprised at how many large companies have their own film and sound studios for in-house work. It doesn't take too big an operation to justify having one over paying a contractor to do it every time you need something updated.