IRS Edges Closer to 21St-Century Computing

Adopting OCR, a direct e-file system, and chat (and voice) bots would go a long way to professionalize and streamline IRS operations and equip its agents with the task-appropriate IT tools. And these upgrades may not necessarily leave workers unemployed as automation and other programmatic efficiencies often do. Since a bipartisan defunding campaign has left the agency with too few employees, workers who are no longer burdened with data entry tasks could ideally be reassigned to more important jobs within the agency.

Yet leveraging emerging technologies comes with a big asterisk. The agency’s decision to stick with COBOL as its programming language means that a 2018-like meltdown (or perhaps something worse) remains a constant threat. The IRS will not be able to move forward if it keeps COBOL, which originally debuted in 1959, running. Eric Egan, a policy fellow with the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, a research and educational think tank, says that what Latin is to English, COBOL is to most modern programming languages. Yet since the IRA mandates the “operation and maintenance of legacy systems,” the agency currently has little choice.