Both the House and Senate have taken important steps toward ending the wasteful and risky Internal Revenue Service (IRS) private tax collection program. The House Ways and Means Committee approved a bill (H.R. 3056) that would repeal the program, and the Senate Appropriations Committee cleared a bill (H.R. 2829) that would tightly limit the funding available at the IRS to administer the program. Both committees reached approval by slim margins. H.R. 3056, the Ways and Means bill, was approved on a party line by 23-18, and H.R. 2829, the bill with spending restrictions, by 15-14. The White House has threatened to veto H.R. 2829, but on grounds not related to the debt collection program. It has not issued a statement regarding H.R. 3056. The private tax collection program lets private companies track down taxpayers who have not paid a small amount of outstanding taxes (see an OMB Watch summary of the program). If the IRS did the same work in-house, it could bring in nearly three times as much money as the private debt collectors. Additionally, letting profit-motivated companies handle sensitive tax matters has raised concerns both inside and out of Congress regarding privacy and taxpayer rights. H.R. 3056 contains nearly the same language regarding the private collection program as H.R. 695, a bill co-sponsored by Reps. Steven Rothman (D-NJ) and Chris Van Hollen (D-MD). The primary difference between the two bills is that H.R. 3056 would not abrogate contracts that have already been issued to private debt collectors. This difference may dampen the opposition to the legislation from companies who have already won contracts from the government, as they would no longer stand to lose money if the contracts were not left intact. During the debate over H.R. 3056, defenders of the debt collection program argued that using private debt collectors is a way to avoid the opportunity cost of pursuing small tax debts. The IRS, program supporters claim, does not have enough funding to pursue the cases that have been handed over the private agencies, and even if more funding were given to IRS, it would use it to pursue cases yielding a higher rate of return. However, as several legislators pointed out, the IRS has already spent $71 million to set up and administer the program. If spent elsewhere, this money could have brought in $1.4 billion in two years, while the program has only brought in $20 million over that same time period. Ending the program would cost $1.1 billion over 10 years, according to the Congressional Budget Office. H.R. 3056 offsets this cost by increasing taxes on people who have renounced their citizenship, as well as reinstating and increasing certain penalties and interest regarding taxes (see a full list of offsets). The bill also contains a few other minor changes in tax law, including a one-year delay on a withholding requirement for government goods and services and language ensuring residents of the Virgin Islands are entitled to the same taxpayer rights as residents of the United States. No plans have yet been made for either bill to be considered by the full House or Senate. The House has approved its companion to the Senate's draft of H.R. 2829, though language that would have limited funding for the debt collection program was removed on a point of order challenge on the floor. A Senate companion to H.R. 695 — S. 335 — has gained 21 co-sponsors but has not yet been considered by the Senate Finance Committee. While it is still unclear which mechanism will be used to end the program, there has been significant momentum to find a workable solution.