IRS says focus on wealthy

(Reuters) – The US Internal Revenue Service is focusing its audits on wealthy individuals and corporations as part of a broader effort to increase enforcement, the agency chief told lawmakers this week. IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman disputed a suggestion at a congressional hearing that the agency has been lax in going after rich people and big companies. "Our long-term investment is to have a trend where wealthy individuals, large corporations, (those) who have really benefited from being in the United States, we’re goingto make sure that they pay their taxes," Shulman, an appointee of former president George W. Bush, told a U.S. House of Representatives Appropriations subcommittee hearing on the agency’s 2010 budget request.