NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — Close to 15% of federal taxes — or $385 billion — went unpaid in 2006, according to new estimates by the IRS.

That’s the net tax gap number — meaning what didn’t get paid even after the $65 billion the IRS managed to collect through audits.

And it’s the closest proxy policymakers have to the country’s annual revenue shortfall, said Mark Luscomb, the principal federal tax analyst at CCH, a tax information publisher.

What’s driving the shortfall? A whopping 84% of the total tax gap is due to underreporting of income by corporations, small businesses and individuals.

WASHINGTON — The Internal Revenue Service has paid out more than a half-billion dollars in homebuyer tax credits to people who probably didn’t qualify, a government investigator said Friday.

Most of the money — about $326 million — went to more than 47,000 taxpayers who didn’t qualify as first-time homebuyers because there was evidence they had already owned homes, said the report by J. Russell George, the Treasury inspector general for tax administration. Other credits went to prison inmates, taxpayers who bought homes before the credit was enacted and people who did not actually buy homes.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — Watch out millionaires: The IRS is coming for you.

Especially if you make more than $10 million. Audits of these folks surged 73% last year, hitting more than 18% of taxpayers in the highest income bracket, according to recently released statistics from the IRS.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Top Democrats are uniting with Republicans in a show of support for small business owners: Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., said Friday that he will introduce legislation to repeal the expanded 1099 reporting requirements set to take effect in 2012.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Tax season is upon us. And while nobody likes shelling out their hard-earned dollars to the IRS, this year the government is offering up some new opportunities that could save you big money.

As part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, or stimulus bill, Congress introduced several new tax goodies that could help millions of Americans save — as long as they know to claim them.

“The purpose of these credits is to give back the maximum amount of money to taxpayers so that Americans spend a little more and help the economy,” said Jerry Morphis, CPA and owner of Accutax & Accounting, “but the new credits are not common knowledge.”

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — The tax man has gotten a lot more aggressive in slapping liens on taxpayers who are seriously delinquent in their payments.

In fact, the Internal Revenue Service issued 475% more liens last year than it did in 1999.

CHICAGO – Some Americans are learning a jarring lesson about unemployment as they prepare their tax returns.

At a time when the newly laid-off are swelling unemployment rolls to record numbers, the painful surprise for many is that jobless benefits are taxed like income. That leaves many on the hook for hundreds or thousands of dollars because the taxes aren’t automatically withheld from benefit checks.