{ "source": "Cooked Index — occupational AI risk register", "page": "https://cookedindex.com/jobs/tax-examiners-and-collectors-and-revenue-agents/", "methodology": "https://cookedindex.com/methodology", "notice": "Verdicts are re-examined as evidence accumulates. Re-fetch before relying on this; the page above always carries the current score.", "scored_at": "2026-08-11", "model": "claude-opus-5", "occupation": { "title": "Tax Examiners and Collectors, and Revenue Agents", "soc_code": "13-2081", "category": "Business", "us_employment": 56610, "median_annual_wage": 62370 }, "verdict": "EXPOSED", "risk_resistance": 34, "contested": false, "near_boundary": true, "dimensions": { "task_resistance": 6, "embodiment": 5, "liability_shield": 8, "trust_premium": 5, "judgment_accountability": 10 }, "reasoning": { "task_resistance": "The modal examiner's day is comparing a 1040 against W-2s and 1099s, recomputing EITC eligibility, issuing CP2000 and CP-series notices, and closing correspondence audits from a queue — work the IRS's own Automated Underreporter and math-error programs already do without a human, which is why this sits at 6 rather than the 10-12 a field revenue agent reconstructing a partnership's books would earn.", "embodiment": "Above pure desk work because field collection and field audit mean going to the taxpayer's place of business to inspect records, inventory, and assets, serving levies and seizing property, and occasional site visits with a POA present — but that's a minority of positions and the rest is a terminal, IDRS, and a phone, holding it to 5.", "liability_shield": "There is no licence to examine returns for the government — Revenue Agent positions require 30 semester hours of accounting, not a CPA, and the assessment is the Service's, not the individual's — but delegated authority under IRC 6320/6330 and 7122 means a specific examiner's signature attaches to liens, levies, and compromise acceptances and is reviewable in Appeals and Tax Court, which is what earns 8 instead of 3.", "trust_premium": "Taxpayers do not choose their examiner and most never learn a name beyond a badge number on a letter; the repeat-relationship element that exists — working the same representative or corporate tax department across a multi-year LB&I cycle — is thin and reassignable, so 5.", "judgment_accountability": "Real discretion exists in reasonable-cause penalty abatement, evaluating collectibility on an offer in compromise, and deciding whether to expand an audit's scope, but it is exercised inside the IRM with mandatory managerial approval thresholds, DATL review, and Appeals as a backstop, which keeps this at 10 rather than the 15+ of someone whose call is final and unreviewed." }, "rationale": "The bulk of this work — matching reported income against third-party data, flagging arithmetic and eligibility errors, sending deficiency notices, computing interest and penalties, and processing correspondence audits — is structured data comparison that automated matching systems already do at scale and that AI extends further. What survives is the enforcement tier: field audits of complex business books, interviewing taxpayers and representatives, exercising statutory discretion on offers in compromise, liens, levies, and penalty abatement, and defending findings in appeals. Score reflects the modal examiner doing desk review; senior revenue agents auditing partnerships and corporations sit materially higher.", "outlook": "Desk examination headcount shrinks as automated matching and AI notice generation absorb it, while field audit, fraud, and collection-enforcement roles hold or grow with enforcement funding.", "what_would_raise_it": { "levers": [ { "dimension": "task_resistance", "change": "Automated matching absorbs the desk-review tier (AUR, correspondence audits, math-error notices) so the remaining headcount is concentrated in field examination of pass-through entities, transfer pricing, and crypto/basis reconstruction — the IRS's stated LB&I and partnership audit build-out under the IRA funding already shifts hiring toward revenue agents rather than tax examiners. This is task-mix shift, not new capability resistance.", "plausibility": "already happening", "would_add": 5 }, { "dimension": "judgment_accountability", "change": "If statutory discretion over offers in compromise, trust fund recovery penalty assessments under IRC 6672, and penalty abatement for reasonable cause is formally reserved to a named human examiner — e.g. IRM revisions or a Taxpayer First Act-style requirement that adverse determinations be signed by an identified employee with reviewable rationale — the surviving role owns consequential ambiguous calls.", "plausibility": "plausible", "would_add": 5 }, { "dimension": "liability_shield", "change": "A codified prohibition on fully automated adverse determinations, similar to Section 1001 of the Taxpayer First Act's independent appeals right or state-level bills barring automated final assessment, requiring a named agent's signature on statutory notices of deficiency, jeopardy assessments, and levy approvals, with supervisory personal accountability under IRC 6751(b)-style written-approval rules already litigated in Tax Court.", "plausibility": "plausible", "would_add": 4 }, { "dimension": "judgment_accountability", "change": "Post-Loper Bright and Boechler litigation pressure making agency determinations more contestable raises the evidentiary burden on the examiner who signed the case file, since AI-generated workpapers without a human author's testimony are weak in Tax Court and Appeals.", "plausibility": "plausible", "would_add": 2 } ], "ceiling_note": "Trust premium has no route: taxpayers are involuntary counterparties who would generally prefer an automated process to a human examiner, and the buyer (Congress/Treasury) is buying revenue yield per dollar, not human contact. Embodiment is capped near current levels — field audits involve travel and document inspection but nothing physically unpredictable." }, "adjudication": { "method": "two independent runs agreed on the verdict", "outcome": "corroborated", "run_totals": [ 34, 36 ], "run_verdicts": [ "EXPOSED", "EXPOSED" ] }, "employment_history": { "points": [ { "y": 2017, "emp": 56660, "wage": 53130 }, { "y": 2018, "emp": 54550, "wage": 54440 }, { "y": 2019, "emp": 53760, "wage": 54890 }, { "y": 2020, "emp": 53150, "wage": 55640 }, { "y": 2021, "emp": 52270, "wage": 56780 }, { "y": 2022, "emp": 50610, "wage": 57950 }, { "y": 2023, "emp": 50250, "wage": 58530 }, { "y": 2024, "emp": 53530, "wage": 59740 }, { "y": 2025, "emp": 56610, "wage": 62370 } ], "from": 2017, "to": 2025, "change_pct": -0.1, "comparable_from": 2019, "spans_soc_revision": true }, "pivots": [ { "slug": "personal-financial-advisors", "title": "Personal Financial Advisors", "verdict": "EXPOSED", "risk_resistance": 52, "median_wage": 105070, "overlap": 72, "skills_to_close": [ "Management of Financial Resources", "Systems Analysis", "Systems Evaluation", "Operations Analysis" ] }, { "slug": "securities-commodities-and-financial-services-sales-agents", "title": "Securities, Commodities, and Financial Services Sales Agents", "verdict": "EXPOSED", "risk_resistance": 51, "median_wage": 78660, "overlap": 67, "skills_to_close": [ "Management of Financial Resources", "Systems Analysis", "Persuasion", "Systems Evaluation" ] } ], "license": "https://cookedindex.com/terms" }