BNA reported (sorry, no link) last night that the IRS is set to step up its enforcement of the tax code by hiring additional revenue agents and officers. While you might not like the IRS, this is great news for starting to chip away at the $345 billion annual tax gap. Deputy Commission for Services and Enforcement Linda Stiff gives more details:

The Internal Revenue Service will hire more than 3,500 frontline enforcement employees as it embarks on its largest hiring initiative in recent history, Deputy Commissioner for Services and Enforcement Linda E. Stiff said March 30.

This number includes more than 2,000 new revenue agents and revenue officers, Stiff said during a luncheon at the Tax Executives Institute's 59th Midyear Conference. Several hundred of these new hires will be directed at large corporate compliance, and as many as 700 will be hired to deal with international issues, she said.

The hiring push comes on the heels of the fiscal year 2009 omnibus bill, which contains $630 million above IRS's current funding level for it to address noncompliance through improved technology, collection efforts, and audits, Stiff said.

Image by Flickr user alykat, used under a Creative Commons license.