It was a promise repeated many times by President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s administration: The Internal Revenue Service would conduct more audits of wealthy Americans, but audit rates would not rise for households earning less than $400,000 per year.
Mr. Biden and the Democrats made that pledge as they bolstered funding for the I.R.S., hoping that more enforcement aimed at wealthy tax evaders would generate revenue to pay for climate and health care programs.
Republican lawmakers warned that more money for the I.R.S. would lead to more audits across the board, and that middle-class taxpayers would be targeted.
But [sic] new data released by the I.R.S. last week suggests that the agency upheld Mr. Biden’s promise in 2024. With an audit rate of 0.8 percent, people making over $500,000 on their latest return were more than twice as likely to be audited compared with the same point in the audit cycle in previous years.
Meanwhile, the matching audit rate for taxpayers making under $500,000 declined slightly. The figures covered 2022 tax returns that were filed in 2023 and audited during the 2024 fiscal year, which ended Sept. 30.
With more funding during the Biden administration, I.R.S. staffing grew to about 100,000 employees from 80,000. But President Trump has sought big cuts. More than 20,000 employees offered to resign earlier this year, while others have been fired. A recent inspector general’s report showed that the agency now has closer to 90,000 employees. And congressional Republicans have rescinded or frozen the extra I.R.S. enforcement funding.
While the number of audits opened on wealthy taxpayers did spike last year, an audit can take several years to close, especially for a high-income return. The I.R.S. closed fewer audits last year than in any year except 2020, when adjusted for the number of returns filed. Audit collections decreased to $29 billion, down 10 percent from 2023.