Tax Code "Clutter"

The IRS tax payer "advocate" in his concern for "clutter" wants to eliminate tax deductions which "clutter" up the tax forms.

NYT reports:

One of the advocate’s suggestions for streamlining the tax code was to repeal the alternative minimum tax, a parallel tax system intended to make sure rich Americans pay a fair amount in taxes, which is increasingly engulfing middle-class taxpayers. Another was to reduce the number of income exclusions, deductions and credits, known collectively as “tax expenditures,” that clutter up the tax code.[...] 

The national taxpayer advocate, an independent position with the I.R.S. that Congress created to assist taxpayers in resolving problems, also criticized Congress’s recent budget cuts to the I.R.S.

(ht Joe Cotter)