The Internal Revenue Service is expected to use $881 million of taxpayers’ money to implement the first four years of Obamacare, including about $500 million that the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) diverted to the agency, according to a federal audit.
The new Government Accountability Office (GAO) audit refers to ObamaCare – the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, which became law in March 2010 – as a “significant effort for IRS.”
The IRS’ “implementation costs” are expected to total $881 million from fiscal years 2010 to 2013, it says.
Of the $881 million, $521 million will come from the HHS’ Health Insurance Reform Implementation Fund (HIRIF) – called a “slush fund” by Republican critics. The remaining $360 million will come from the IRS’s 2013 budget request, expected to be awarded through the congressional appropriations process.
Congress awarded the HIRIF $1 billion to implement the health care overhaul. The GAO has said that the transfer of $521 million of those funds to the IRS is legal.
As of the end of FY2011, IRS had received $187 million of the HHS money, according to the audit. The agency is expected to get the remaining $332 million by the end of this fiscal year, and as of April 27 had been awarded $135 million of that amount.
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