Irs, Doj

[taxwonk]

Suppose for the sake of argument that a tax lawyer was tired of all the games and wanted to try life from the inside. First off, is the IRS hiring? Same for DOJ or Treasury. What sort of jobs do they have for people at a fairly senior level of experience? Is the pay cut offset by benefits, a slower pace, or the joy of working for the angels?

Any insights or thoughts would be helpful.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by taxwonk
Suppose for the sake of argument that a tax lawyer was tired of all the games and wanted to try life from the inside. First off, is the IRS hiring? Same for DOJ or Treasury. What sort of jobs do they have for people at a fairly senior level of experience? Is the pay cut offset by benefits, a slower pace, or the joy of working for the angels?

Any insights or thoughts would be helpful.

What type of tax law? That is, do you want to do trial work? I'm vaguely familiar with DOJ tax, through others, and from what I can tell people are very happy there. But I think they tend to me more junior people. The senior people have either been around a while or, at the highest level, are politicos. But that's not to say you couldn't go there even at a more advanced point in your career.

As for IRS, dunno, but I thought IRS didn't do much real lawyering--tax policy is done at treasury and enforcement against tax cheats is done by DOJ. But maybe there's something else that IRS needs lawyers for (other than HR type stuff)

[ltl/fb]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
What type of tax law? That is, do you want to do trial work? I'm vaguely familiar with DOJ tax, through others, and from what I can tell people are very happy there. But I think they tend to me more junior people. The senior people have either been around a while or, at the highest level, are politicos. But that's not to say you couldn't go there even at a more advanced point in your career.

As for IRS, dunno, but I thought IRS didn't do much real lawyering--tax policy is done at treasury and enforcement against tax cheats is done by DOJ. But maybe there's something else that IRS needs lawyers for (other than HR type stuff)

The Office of the Chief Counsel has various divisions; there's a book that is kind of blue with an orange stripe that has info on how the CC is divided up etc. I have no idea if they are hiring. They seem to write regulations and at least consult, if not actually doing all the work on, rulings. Sorry I can't remember the name of the book. It seems like most of the CC people are in DC, but I don't really look at any area outside of EP/EO.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
The Office of the Chief Counsel has various divisions;

i should amend what I say. there's probably more lawyering to do than I immediately thought, what with revenue rulings and interpretations and all. Don't know how they battle it out with DOJ though.

http://www.irs.gov/irs/article/0,,id=100956,00.html

[taxwonk]

It's been one of those months where I'm thinking life is too short to deal with some kinds of bullshit. I think I ought to take a look at the directory Fringey spoke of and maybe get a better feel for what's out there.

Thanks guys.

[ltl/fb]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
i should amend what I say. there's probably more lawyering to do than I immediately thought, what with revenue rulings and interpretations and all. Don't know how they battle it out with DOJ though.

http://www.irs.gov/irs/article/0,,id=100956,00.html

I think there is a tax area of the DOJ, but I could be wrong. They no doubt have established rules about who gets what, kinda like whether the DOL or the IRS does regs on things that are in both the Code and ERISA.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
I think there is a tax area of the DOJ, but I could be wrong.

there's definitely a division of tax at DOJ.

here

They do a lot, and folks there are quite happy with the responsiblity and office. They also have field offices. No idea how that is.

[SlaveNoMore]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
there's a book that is kind of blue with an orange stripe that has info on how the CC is divided up etc.

You might possibly be getting this confused with your copy of "The Cat in the Hat"

[baltassoc]

Originally posted by taxwonk
It's been one of those months where I'm thinking life is too short to deal with some kinds of bullshit. I think I ought to take a look at the directory Fringey spoke of and maybe get a better feel for what's out there.

Thanks guys.

Ever thought about being an administrative law judge? I believe the IRS has many AJs, although they may technically be not part of the IRS. I met an AJ recently at a social gathering, and he seemed pretty happy in his job.

[taxwonk]

Originally posted by baltassoc
Ever thought about being an administrative law judge? I believe the IRS has many AJs, although they may technically be not part of the IRS. I met an AJ recently at a social gathering, and he seemed pretty happy in his job.

The only comparable position I can think of in the tax world are Tax Court judges. Unfortunately, to get those positions, one as to be far more politically connected than me or have some significant govt. or high-profile private practice experience. Maybe in ten years. Or when Thurgreed and Paigow sleep together.

This is really funny, what with all the non-tax lawyers trying to explain to the tax lawyer what kinds of lawyers work for the IRS.... I can't answer the questions about pay/QOL/hiring, but I do have a general idea of what kinds of law jobs there are in the government.

1) Litigation. Most of the trial work is done by IRS District Counsel. They handle all Tax Court litigation (i.e., 95% of the meaningful civil tax litigation in the country). My guess is they would hire midlevel- or senior-associate level folks, if that's what you mean by "fairly senior." Good job if you like brief writing. There are also a set of Special Trial Attorneys within IRS who help out on major Tax Court litigation. I would guess you need serious litigation experience to get one of those jobs.

DOJ Tax Division handles the Court of Federal Claims and District and Bankruptcy Courts. The CFC gets some interesting refund cases. The District Courts get tax protestors, summons enforcement, and not much else. There are separate sections of the Tax Division for CFC and other Civil Trial work.

Appellate work is done by the DOJ Tax Division, Appellate Section. Criminal work is done by a separate section (sections?) of DOJ Tax.

There is a quasi-litigation group within DOJ called the Office of Review that reviews proposed settlements in major cases. I imagine that would be sort of a neat job if you have significant tax litigation experience.

2) Non-Litigation. IRS Office of Chief Counsel is a huge organization. They write PLRs, technical advice, legal memoranda to the field and to service centers, litigation support, and work with Treasury on published rulings and regulations projects. They are generally organized by area of tax law, and also have a criminal division that assists in criminal investigation before a referral is made to DOJ for prosecution. There are a lot of people who have made a career of moving in and out of Chief Counsel jobs and private practice jobs seeking rulings from Chief Counsel (generally at the Big 4 national offices or large DC law firms).

In addition, there are separate counsel offices for the major divisions of the IRS (for income tax law, that would be LMSB and SB/SE). I think those offices are where District Counsel is now organizationally located, but in addition to litigation attorneys, the divisions have lawyers who advise the division leadership on national policy matters.

The Treasury Department's Office of Tax Policy does domestic tax policy, rulings and regulations projects, and assists in drafting legislation, through the Office of Tax Legislative Counsel, and performs similar tasks in the international area (including treaty negotiation) through the Office of International Tax Counsel. These folks also have jobs for more senior people with good academic credentials. (They consider themselves pretty intellectual.)

The Joint Committee on Taxation employs a bunch of tax lawyers to help draft and revise legislation, draft explanations of legislation, evaluate large tax settlements, etc. I don't know what it takes to get hired there.

[baltassoc]

Originally posted by taxwonk
The only comparable position I can think of in the tax world are Tax Court judges. [Requires more experience]

Now that you mention it, I think the AJ I met did Social Security Administration work; I may have been confused because he worked in the same building as the local IRS guys. I had suggested it exactly because of the level of experience the guy seemed to have - he was out of law school maybe 12, 15 years, in his early 40s. Anyway, best of luck.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by credit this
This is really funny, what with all the non-tax lawyers trying to explain to the tax lawyer what kinds of lawyers work for the IRS....

Yeah, well where were you yesterday?


As for ALJs, as a general matter, a huge percentage work for SSA because SSA has so many individual cases that need an ALJ. There are a few positions elsewhere, e.g., EPA and FTC, but not nearly as many. I think you almost have to work at SSA for a couple of years as an ALJ. I believe the experience requirements are 7 years of practice including significant trial or admin. trial practice (i.e., not just motions from a large firm). Plus, obviously, general qualifications and passing some test given by the ALJ hiring folks.