Trump Lets IRS Fire More Positions at Will
Bloomberg Law, IRS Can Fire More Positions at Will With Trump Executive Order:
Trump’s order strips job security from almost 8,000 federal positions. Under Office of Personnel Management regulations, employees moved into a new job classification—known as Schedule Policy/Career—lose many of the procedural protections most federal workers have, including the right to appeal their removal to an independent body.
A slew of job types could be reclassified at the IRS and its legal arm, according to an appendix released by the White House. More are on the list for the Treasury Department. IRS workers who are senior advisors, human resource specialists, and program managers are among those who could be impacted. For the IRS’s chief counsel office, attorney advisors, senior level counselors to the commissioner, counselor to the general counselor, and senior legal advisor for regulatory affairs will be reclassified.
Fox and Liscow: The Rich’s Real Tax Trick Isn’t ‘Buy, Borrow, Die’
Edward Fox (Michigan) and Zachary Liscow (Yale), “The Rich’s Real Tax Trick Isn’t ‘Buy, Borrow, Die’” (Tax Policy Center, June 15, 2026):
A fashionable theory of how the rich avoid taxes captures something real—but it misses what’s mostly going on. Consider two of the wealthiest billionaires in the US: Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk. The theory says they never sell their stock and never draw a real salary. Instead, they borrow against their appreciated shares to finance yachts, jets, and everything in between. When they die they’ll pass their unsold stock to heirs on a “stepped-up” tax basis, resetting the stock’s value to its price at their death and wiping out any capital gains during their ownership.
Buy, borrow, die? A catchy, scandalous story.
