that may help, but what has unfolded is that what we want to see is a deep level of healing in the life of a young person, but also in the lives of the entire community. >> more sunday night at 8:00 eastern and pacific on c-span's "q&a." >> this week the communicators looks at cyber security. today, two key members of the house of representatives working on cyber issues. >> congressman lee terry, what is the status of cyber security legislation in the house? >> well, there is one bill that everyone has pretty much agreed to, the rogers bill, that allows the n.s.a. to communicate to industries about known threats. that hasn't moved. it's still in committee as we're building on that. well, as you know, the senate is actively pursuing cyber

security legislation, two bills going forward. the lieberman/collins, and the republican bill, where do you stand on those? >> those are ones that we will look at, but we're actually doing our own efforts and energy and commerce in the house of representatives. i was on the speaker's task force and now i'm on -- co-leading with our bipartisan intracommittee that will kind of give us the outline. not that we're recreating the wheel, but we just want to make sure that we're doing it in a little different way than the senate is doing. >> if the collins-lieberman bill comes to the house, what are your thoughts about that specific bill? >> well, you know, i think that bill comes close, but what we're looking at is a way of breaking down barriers to empower private sector internet providers, backbone developers,

first of all, those are the first line. and so we need to empower them. so it's a little bit different philosophy than the lieberman bill or the mccain bill that i think creates a little bit of government involvement and we're trying to facilitate communications as opposed to create something new. >> do you think the department of homeland security is the right vehicle for monitoring cyber security? >> my personal answer to that would be hell, no. i don't think homeland security would be the right entity. and frankly, it flies in the face of industry has to be nimble. they have to be quick. they have to be able to talk to each other. and if they have to community through homeland security or with the permission of homeland security, you tweeted the whole purpose of making them nimble.

>> congressman terri, what about critical infrastructure? what is your approach in including that with any regulatory bill? >> i'll have to see how our working group deals with that. right now we seem to have a consensus that we're going to create all industries alike, make sure they have access to information. and the industries themselves can choose which one is more critical than another. for example, electric generation is probably more important to financial services, to wall street, than to a pass you're in western nebraska. so obviously one is critical or not, but they all have to start with getting information, receiving information from the n.s.a. or others of a relevant threat to them. >> and the development of those standards of what is included and what is not, who is responsible for that? >> that would be within the industry. i really feel and most of us on the task force feel that once you start setting standards and you're empowering a government

agency to develop definitions of critical, than you're locking those entities into a long process. by the time they development a standard, everyone has gone by them. it's about sharing information instantaneously and involving our government agencies into that process is counterproductive. >> now one of the concerns that the house, many members of the house have brought up is the issue of privacy. >> yes. >> within cyber security. what are your views on that? >> well, anytime we start looking at monitoring packets of information flowing through the system, you're going to raise the red flag of privacy. so what we have to be careful about is if the telecommunications or backbone industry is looking into packets to discover known codes that are bot nets or viruses, that's all they can do is to

communicate to each other that that exists out, there it's existent. if we went through an independent, nongovernmental clearinghouse of information, that resolved some of the privacy issues and some of the discussions back and forth with government. it's ok for government to say, hey, we have found this new code. it can be released at any time. you may want to prevent or develop something to prevent this specific code or watch for it, the issue then becomes if during that inspection the backbone operators or network pirates discover something, they shouldn't have to tell that to the government. i think that's where the privacy concerns really come in and we're going to have to set limits on that. >> you used the word "nongovernmental." >> yes. >> what kind of group? >> well, nongovernmental, what

i'm talking about here is the industry group, but they have got to form some level of a clearing house amongst industries where perhaps the n.s.a. or homeland security can community in and that they can distribute the information to the necessary groups to prevent the harm. and as long it's from government to industry through this clearinghouse, i think we resolve a lot of the privacy issues. >> congressman terry, when an individual user on a computer, will they be affected by the cyber security legislation? will they have their records tracked, et cetera? >> well, that's what we can't allow is the tracking of the individual computer user's records. so when we look at authorizing them into looking at packets for the code, the only things they're looking at is one's and zero's.

they don't know anything other than, oops, here is that virus code out there and they can develop something to block only that. >> when we talked with senator susan collins last week, a fellow renteria, she said she is against further burdening business with more regulation and that their bill is not a burden to business, that d.h.s. does take a back seat. >> well, and we're closer to that. what we can't do is regulate because what we do then is freeze industry and that plays well and the "hackers" and attackers go right around them. susan is right on that point. i think there is some issues on their committee or their bill about privacy as well and input from the department of homeland security and n.s.a. and communication back and forth that we have to work on. >> now what is the cyber

security working group? >> the working group is intraenergy and commerce and it's three republicans, three democrats working side by side to develop in essence, the outline for any necessary legislation. >> do you see legislation coming into the house this year and passing? >> yes. i do think so. speaker boehner has made it a goal. we need to do something. the president wants something, so i think there is a positive atmosphere for getting something done this year. >> and again, when you look at the legislation that will be coming, how do you make it comprehensive or do you make it comprehensive? >> well, that's a great question because the more layers as we try to understand the totality of cyber security, we learn one layer and have to

learn the next. so it's very complex. we have to -- part of our goal as a task force is take that complexity and make it simple. that's difficult to do in of itself. what you'll find is a bill that is simple, streamlined saying we're growing to eliminate these barriers, antitrust, facilitate the communications and then simply say go after it. >> what kind of current cyber security legislation is on the books and would a new bill build on that or change it? >> well, that's the issue, is there really isn't a cyber security bill out there. there are certain issues about opting in and opting out and we have discussed spyware and malware. it's hard to define so there isn't a hard bill or law on the books. so actually i think we're building some from scratch here. so the issue is that we got to

remove barriers, not develop any new bureaucracy or really new mandates. >> do you have firms in omaha that you represent that are interested in this legislation, are people back home interested in this? >> it surprised me how interested people are back home about cyber security. so when i bring it up, i always get a lively conversation. there are firms back home, a lot of telecommunications, network providers. level 3 started in omaha, so there is probably a little higher understanding of cyber security because of the businesses in omaha. >> we have been talking with representative lee terry, republican of nebraska, member of the energy and commerce committee and co-head of the cyber security working group. congressman, thank you. >> thank you. >> and now joining us on

communicators is representative jim langevin. he is the co-founder of the house cyber security caucus as well as the top democrat on the armed services subcommittee on emerging threats and capabilities. congressman langevin joins us from providence, rowed island. could you start by telling us your view on the collins-lieberman cyber security bill that is currently in the senate? >> sure, i would be glad to. first thank you very much for your continued interest in this very important topic. on the collins-lieberman legislation, let me just say that i'm very pleased that senator lieberman and senator collins have finally introduced a comprehensive bill on cyber security. it certainly isn't strong enough, in my opinion. i would like to see it stronger, but it is a very good start, a move in the right direction. i commend them for their due diligence and really for trying to move this issue forward.

we can't let the perfect be the enemy of the good, and it's certainly something i would like to see move along and hopefully get through a conference committee with the house and the senate. >> congressman, when you say it's not strong enough, in what areas? >> well, one of the things, of course, it relies on is department of homeland security and working with the private sector to come up with standards for a critical infrastructure, for example. that's a good first start. i think it's going to really take probably stronger measures to put in place rather than this initial effort. i think it's a good first start. i will wait to see how it unfolds and to see more of the specifics. if in fact, it passes, the type of standards that are adopted

and then how they're implemented. the stronger the standards, the more the confidence i'll have in its effect. >> now you mentioned d.h.s. in your view, is d.h.s. the right agency because some of the bills that have been pushed in the house have the military, have a military aspect to them. >> what i have called is for a cyber security director in the office of the white house, basically giving that position much more directive authority to coordinate and implement cyber security protections. department of homeland security is going to be part of the equation and they're doing the best they can with the tools and the resources that they have. they have been challenged because they don't have the right and the most robust authorities to compel other departments and agencies to engage in cyber security. it may not be the mission, for

example, of the department of treasury or commerce or state to protect their government. they have other focuses. we need cyber security to be the primary focus and an entity that has budgetary authority to compel adoption of robust cyber security standards. i have at advocated and the commission in which i co-chair called for a position to be established within the white house with this robust policy and budgetary authority. that being said, the lieberman-collins legislation does give d.h.s. more authority than what they have now and it begins the process of close collaboration between the government and private sector. it will require a public-private sector to get it done right. that is a highlight in the bill that support. >> congressman langevin, how do

you address the privacy concerns that have been raised by the aclu, the electronic privacy center and other groups regarding cyber security and the definition of threats? >> right, it's a very good point to raise privacy and civil abuse concerns. this is something we have been very attuned to, very sensitive to, and we have to work with these groups to instill confidence that we're doing this the right way. i don't want government to have any stronger response to this. i believe that the internet should be open and free. that's the way it was designed and we want to maintain that openness and that government regulation should have the lightest touch possible and always respecting privacy and civil libts concerns. where the greatest damage can be done in critical infrastructure for example by way of the electric grid is probably the best example.

clearly the government and the american people have a legitimate public policy interest in making sure that we are protecting those entities, those sectors much more strongly than right now. the electric grid is not adopting strong enough robust cyber security protections and it makes them incredibly vulnerable to a cyber attack that should shut down, for example, a whole sector of the country's electric grid which could do massive damage to our economy and potentially even loss of life. >> now, senator mccain has introduced a cyber security bill which isn't quite at stringent as the collins-lieberman bill. and he says, according to him, the senate democrat bill is a regulatory leviathon. there are concerns from companies as well. how do you address those? >> well, i would say that in some ways, senator mccain misses the point in that your

good intentions alone aren't going to get us to where we need to be in terms of providing robust cyber security and protecting our critical infrastructure. the main difference between the lieberman/collins bill and the mccain bill is that the lieberman/collins bill employs a mechanism whereby you have closer coordinate between the public and private sector in setting standards, more stronger cyber security standards to protect critical infrastructure. they also, the collins-lieberman bill also sets up a mechanism for information sharing whereby the government would be able to share classified information, signatures, if you will, threat signatures with the private sector and in return also the private sector could share information with the government. it needs to be both ways. right now either through law or through practice, it's not

possible for that level of information sharing to occur. the mccain bill primarily only focuses on voluntary information sharing. again, an important part of the equation, but it doesn't get us where we really need to be. think about it in this way. everyone would pretty much agree that we have among the safest airlines in the country and the good intentions of the airlines of wanting to get people safely from point a to point b, that's great that they have the good intentions to do that and i'm sure for the most part they would accomplish that goal. but those good intentions alone clearly don't provide the level of safety and security that the american people demand and require, so therefore, we have the f.a.a. and the mtsb that comes in and makes sure we're getting that much further to have the safest airlines in the country. that's what this is all about in providing better, more robust cyber security, protecting infrastructure, our

electric grid, our banking system and telecommunications system among others. >> congressman langevin, if you would, talk about current legislative action or proposals in the house and where you stand on them. >> sure. well, there are a couple major bills that i'm supporting, one of which is the rogers rupersberger bill. i sit on the intelligence committee. chairman rogers and myself and several others have co-sponsored and supported legislation to provide for more robust information sharing as i described between the government and the private sector sharing classified information or threat information back and forth. that bill has passed almost unanimously out of the house intelligence committee. i was proud to vote for it. i'm hopeful that bill will be coming to the floor soon. another will be another bill in the homeland security committee that will set stronger standards for protecting

critical infrastructure as well as providing a mechanism for information sharing. so important steps forward, we can't let the perfect be the enemy of the good and whether it's an individual piece of legislation that will move forward or a comprehensive bill like what has been introduced on the senate side, we have to get something done. we're too vulnerable right now to potential attack. it's not just from a nation's state that we have to worry about this. these tools, weapons if you will through just a few key strokes could be accomplished by an individual, a terrorist, a criminal enterprise, or a nation state attack. and we're very vulnerable. i don't want to overhype the problem, but clearly the threat exists and i'm trying to raise the awareness of this. i look at this as we're probably in a pre9/11 moment. we have a moment to protect our critical infrastructure and protect the people, we have to act with the greatest sense of

urgency. the last point i'll make is there are other aspects of cyber threats that we're seeing right now. cyber attack is one of the most worst things that could happen. we're trying to prevent that from occurring right now. the other thing that we're seeing clearly on a daily basis is cyber criminal activity and cyber espionage. we all know someone who has had their bank account hacked, money stolen, credit card information stolen and abused, their identity stolen through electronic means and causing great personal problems on an individual level or more broadly in terms of groups of people having their information stolen or abused. we also see on the cyber espionage side, there are companies, particularly in the defense industry, are getting hacked, penetrated on a daily basis and billions of dollar of r and d work are being stolen by our competitors and adversaries that they're scooping up and capitalizing on. their getting their r and d

free. it is costing american jobs. it is costing america being the leaders in innovation and economic competitors. we'll at a real disadvantaged position right now. we have to act more quickly to protect this kind of information. >> congressman, langevin, you mentioned that you were a co-respondor, a support ert of the rogers cyber security bill. if the lundgren bill is the vehicle that makes to the house floor, would you be supportive of that? >> i'm co-sponsoring congressman lundgren's bill. he has done a good job employing more robust cyber security mechanisms. not a perfect bill by any stretch, but it goes a long way towards established the kind of regulation and option of robust cyber security mechanisms that we need on protecting our critical infrastructures. congressman lundgren recognizes

that our electric grid in particular is vulnerable and the owners and operators of our critical infrastructure and particularly in the electricity sector are not moving fast enough to adopt the robust cyber security tools in many ways because they put profits over the safety and security of the american people. i think that's wrong. we're going to press them harder. >> what's the timetable that you foresee for action in the house of representatives? >> i'm hoping it's going to happen over the next couple of months that we would see one or both of those bills, the rogers or the lundgren bill be brought to the floor. being in the minority, we don't control the schedule. that is up to speaker boehner and his team to decide when those pieces of legislation will be brought up. i'm looking forward to being supportive and commend both chairman rogers and the ranking member as well as congressman lundgren for their continued attention to this issue. most security experts and many

others recognize and have stated repeatedly that cyber security is among the greatest threats that are facing the country today. we have been lucky in many ways that very haven't experienced a major cyber attack. as the f.b.i. has warned, this is also a real serious problem that they're concerned about. we need to act with the greatest sense of urgency. i don't want to overhype the problem, i believe we're in a pre9/11 moment right now. on the other side as i outlined, we're already seeing a great deal of activity in among cyber criminals that are preying on vulnerable citizens and companies as well as espionage that is taking place at the criminal level, the corporate level and costing us jobs and economic competitiveness. this should be a wake-up call to the american people. >> congressman jim langevin, where did you develop your interest in cyber security? was it through your work on the

intelligence and armed services committees? >> that's part of it. it actually started several years ago going back as far as 2006 or 2007. i chaired the subcommittee on homeland security, subcommittee on emerging threats, cyber security and science and technology. one of the things we talked about was the security or vulnerability of our critical infrastructure, especially the electric grid. we had basically the head come before the subcommittee and testify that, yes, they determined that the electric grid is very secure and quite frankly that individual misled congress because they hadn't actually ascertained the information that they said they did need and subsequently had to recant their testimony and apologize to the committee for providing inaccurate information. my work on the homeland subcommittee is in many ways where it started. i co-chaired a national

commission on cyber security to the "csi" commission, the senator for international strategic studies where we had experts both in and out of government from around the country sit in on this commission and help us develop a blueprint of how best to provide cyber security for the country. we produced a pretty robust document that helped us to show where we needed to be to make sure we get this right. >> do you hear from your constituents on this issue? >> some. in particular companies that are in the i.t. field and the i.t. sector and the cyber security sector that understand how important this issue really is. the other thing that we're also, i want to focus our attention on is, although this is also a national security threat, it poses a challenge and an opportunity for us in creating jobs because we don't nearly have enough people in the field of cyber security that with the right skills to protect the nation in

cyberspace. the director of the c.i.a. center for information technology basically said that we only have about 1,000 people that can operate at a world class level in cyberspace. what we really need is somewhere between 20,000 and 30,000 people. i have been looking for efforts and have been involved in efforts in trying to get our young people engaged in this problem and get them interested in the field of cyber security. we launched a cyber challenge at the high school level that puts the kids that are interested in cyber issues through a series of challenges and tests to test their cyber security skills. we recognized them with prizes and awards. it's the idea of getting them interested in the field that they think they might be good at and they might do and get them thinking about this as a career field. we got to work harder on closing the skills gap in i.t. and cyber. we have jobs available, but it's a real challenge to find

people with the right skills to fill those jobs. i look at it as a jobs opportunity as well. >> congressman jim langevin, he is a democrat from rhode island, he is a member of the arms service kes where he serves as the top democrat on the emerging threats and capabilities subcommittee. he is the co-founder of the house cyber security caucus. he has been a guest on the communicators. thank you, congressman. >> thank you. >> here is a look at congress next week. the house gaveled in monday at noon eastern beginning legislative business at 2:00. on the agenda, 90 day of highway and surface transportation programs. the current extension expires march 31. the house will consider a republican upon soared budget for next year. you can watch live coverage of the house on espn. the senate returns monday at 2:00 p.m. eastern and begins debate at 4:30 p.m. on a bill

to roll back tax breaks for oil companies. also possible next week, work on a little overhauling the u.s. postal service. live coverage of the senate on espn2. on newsmakers, the director of the consumer financial protection bureau talks about how the new agency is shaping up and the obstacles it faces. newsmakers, sunday at 10:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. i.r.s. commissioner douglas shulman was on capitol hill last week testifying about this year's tax filing season noting that the agency has 5,000 fewer employees than last year. the commissioner requested an 8% budget increase for 2013 with an increases focus on tracking fraud after the i.r.s. found $14 billion in fraudulent refunds last year. the department's budget has been cut the past two years. mr. shulman's testimony before the house, ways and means

subcommittee on oversight is about an hour. >> thank you very much to all of the members of the subcommittee for giving me the opportunity to testify today. i want i want to talk a little bit about filing season, our strategic initiatives, and the president's 2013 budget which would give us a much needed increase over the 2012 inactive levels. a significant portion of the president's 2013 budget would restore congressional reductions in irs funding made over the last two years. i want to start by saying that i believe it is incumbent on all those in the government to be as efficient as possible and spend taxpayer dollars wisely. the irs, that means finding savings were weekend and continuing to invest in strategic priorities that allow

us to improve service in voluntary compliance. from fiscal year 2009 through the 2013 proposed budget, we will have achieved nearly $1 billion in budget savings and efficiencies in core irs operations. these savings and efficiencies reflect and across the board commitment at the irs to find better and more efficient ways to administer the tax >> our compliance activities brought in a direct revenue of

$55 billion. and we blocked another $14 billion from going out the door to taxpayers who are trying to commit fraud on the government. in this regard, i want to point out that the administration's proposal for iras funding in close critically important enforcement initiatives that would be funded through a program integrity cap adjustment. let me just say that this proposal makes sense and is a reflection of the president and this administration's belief that irs funding actually helps reduce the deficit. congress is literally leaving money on the table if it does not enact this proposal which would allow forward deficit reducing initiatives in tax compliance while leaving specific funding decisions it to the normal, annual preparations process. let me just talk about a couple of things that we have done over

the last few years that have moved the agency forward to position it for the future and do a better job of serving taxpayers and making sure they comply with the tax code. let restart with filing season. e-file continues to grow. this year, we issued 59 million refunds. that is about the same number of last year. and we deployed several newell, a large technology -- new, large technology's systems. in strategic areas, this year for the first time in history, we have moved from zero weekly batch cycle to daily processing of tax returns through k2. k2 delivers on the promise of

modernization going back two decades and we are very proud of this achievement. a couple of years ago i told this committee we restructured our technology program and we would deliver our major technology initiatives and this year we have delivered those initiatives. we have also had the highest score ever last year on the american customer satisfaction index rating, which is the overall score we track for taxpayers satisfaction with their interactions with the irs. we scored 73 on this index and we are very proud of this achievement in constrained budget environment. our returned repair program is up and running. today, more than 840,000 preparers have registered and both of the testing and education requirements are under way. this is going to be one of the most important initiatives in the tax system and several decades.

we have also made significant progress in our battle against offshore tax evasion. we have collected more than $4.4 billion to date through our offshore voluntary disclosure program. we are getting people back in the system through this and other offshore initiatives. and i think we have made significant progress -- we have $1 billion out of our core operating budget to the 2013 budget statement -- proposal that we have given. let me conclude my opening statement with one concern. that i want to emphasize for this subcommittee. and i think it is quite important for the ways and means committee. in recent years, it seems taxpayers increasingly face uncertainty about what the tax law will be for the next filing season. this year, we at the irs are very concerned with the status

of the amt and so-called extenders. if the amt is not dealt with in a timely fashion, we may have to delay the start of filing season for many millions of taxpayers as we have done in prior years. and i have written to this committee before that it is imperative that whatever action congress decides to take on amt and extenders' that this action happen by the end of the year which would still be late from an operational perspective but not longer than that in order to prevent even more widespread destruction of next year's tax filing season. >> thank you commissioner doug shulman. we will turn to questioning out. we will alternate between sides with five minutes of being given to every member.

last year you testified to the committee that enforcement and customer service are not an either/or proposition. providing customer service is important to help taxpayers avoid unintentional errors, invert noncompliant and reduce other burdensome post filing interaction. so far this filing season, access to live irs and sisters is down to 65% and taxpayers are waiting an average of 18 minutes to talk with an irs a sist ssister. taxpayers getting disconnected or busy signals have doubled. this is not a new problem that seems to be a bad trend. since 2004, the percentage of answer calls has dropped from 87% to 70% last year, the average wait time was 12 minutes.

in 2007, it was five minutes or less. personally, i have heard from kansas cpa's that is not uncommon to be on hold for 30 minutes. according to gao does decline in customer service has occurred despite the number of full-time equivalent dedicated to answering the phone, having increased from 8000 in fiscal year 2007 to 8800 in 2011 and despite greater use of automated answers and self-service web site options. it seems to me the irs has placed greater emphasis on enforcement at the expense of service. yet as you told us last year, the lack of service for those who have questions will only lead to greater noncompliance than if those questions have been answered. can you help me better understand a few things? first, what actions are being taken to ensure that taxpayers are able to reach a live irs

assister. given your believe the irs must deliver those enforcement and customer service, do you think this budget request focuses too much on enforcement while sacrificing customer service? finally, does the irs consider this to be an acceptable level of service? >> no. thanks for bringing up us set of important issues. first, let me repeat what i told you last year and what i talk about a lot with our employees and members of congress and everyone involved in the tax system which is that it is not an either/or proposition. we need to run service in compliance operations to make the tax system work. let me put in context the resources that we have this year to put towards a code enforcement and customer service.

we had a $300 million budget cut which was $1.2 billion less than the president requested last year. we also had to absorb for rent and other kinds of kinds of $200 million of inflation and $66 million was put into our technology accounts which we are very appreciative all. if you take 300,200, 66, we had a $566 million reduction in all or core services and enforcement accounts. what we are trying to do is do the best we can with the resources we were given. last year, our level of service was 7%. this year is running at 66%, even though we predicted about 61%. the reason for that is we have squeezed efficiency, roddick called carry more people are using automated answering

systems and people are using our website. as you said, the wait is long- term. -- is longer. but it comes to how many people do we have answering phones. volume is up, so the numbers that said that we have more people, we also have much more volume. we have a more complicated tax code right now. another number that is interesting to look at is how many people hang up in the first couple of minutes because we had added a feature that tells them how long it will wait. if you want to use the web or call back when there is less time, then are still mobile service this year is 77% if you look at -- if you take away the people get hung up in the first couple minutes. i guess my view of this is we have taken a bunch of actions. at a certain prado, we need money to invest because you need people to answer phones for live service.

i am pretty proud that wall service is down, it is not degraded - -while services down, it is not degraded to a point to where it could've gone given the costs. do we think it's acceptable? i want everyone who context the irs to get what they need. this year, everyone is not getting what they need, but we are doing a pretty good job given the resources we were given. >> thank you, commissioner. i am looking at data and the budget cuts compared to the level of service are not always, they don't always follow, given this information from the gao. we just encourage you to continue to work on that and we would be delighted to work to do anyway weekend. with that, i would recognize mr. lewis for 5 minutes per >> thank you, very m. >> the gao notes there has been

a 34% increase in the number of calls for this filing season and a 50% increase in calls answered by the automated phone service. can you tell us what are the taxpayers calling about? what is the nature of the calls? >> calls can be anything from people want to set up a payment plan, to people are curious. i'm filling out my return and i'm going to take this deduction. how does that work? just general tax law questions, two questions about where is my refund? i filed last friday it and my procure told me i would get a refund and i have not got it. calls very. ary. we can give you a breakdown para >> thank you very much. we understand there is a request of a cap adjustment of $700

million. what are your plans if any if the agency does not receive these resources? >> we are still early in the congressional budget and appropriations cycle. and so we are quite hopeful, and in the past, we have had broad bipartisan support for cap adjustments. the most recent half a dozen it was 2006-2007 with a republican president. and a democratically controlled congress. so we actually think this is a bipartisan proposal. it reflects the administration's belief that prudent investments in the irs are good for deficit reduction. and so there should be cap adjustments for our budget. and that investments for oz is good for the long term for the tax system. right now i think our position

is that this budget program integrity cap adjustments are good for the system. we have had good, productive conversations in both the house and senate about it. >> mr. commissioner, could you tell members of the thecommittee, how does budget cut impact to the taxpayer service this year and what taxpayers services have been reduced? >> for ms. jenkins, i walked through the $300 million at the top, but the impact is greater given where the resources were put in our budget. i think we have a slight dip in number of taxpayers served in walk-in center, but we have had a corresponding increase in number of taxpayers served in volunteer, vita sites,

where we encourage them to go. a powerful mobile a service is down by 4% compared to last year, although automated calls are up. and the wait times are longer. the way i characterize it is there has been a predictable effect because of less resources. with that said, i am quite proud that we had been able to mitigate some of that effect by making sure we work smart and we drive efficiencies as hard as weekend heard >> thank you very much. i yield back. >> thank you, mr. lewis. and now we will give five minutes to the representative of minnesota. >> thank you. thank you, commissioner for being here today. i wanted to follow-up on a

letter i sent to you. you have been talking a great deal about this concept of a real time tax system. and have had a number of public meetings on the issue as well. and i know there are benefits to receiving real time verification and having that information on hand, but i am having this filing system could lead to a burden that is very similar to the 1099 system. i am sure that you're going to want more 1099 data as well. it seems that compressing is reporting timeline will make it more challenging for rorrequiren ordes an right now. let me ask you this. what are you doing to work with existing stakeholders, with the business community to kind of

get their feedback, thereby because there is in no doubt that increased regulatory and compliance costs are a big deal for employers. can you talk about that? have you conducted any studies of the increased cost to businesses of changing deadlines for reporting informational returns or increase in reporting requirements or would you agree to an independent study as a part of that process? >> great questions and important set of issues. let me give you perspective. i view one of my job as commissioner to make sure i am hoping prod the tax system for a sort of works better 10 years in 20 years from now than it does today. and the combination of consumer expectations of us working better and quicker and more

timely with taxpayers with the advances in technology clearly there is room for us to think about a future that works better for people. what really struck me is the average taxpayer, if they have an interaction with us beyond it just filing, that interaction -- they have their economic activity when you. they file their return. and it can take as a year to two years to reach out to them. by the time we go back to them, they have spent their refund or their records and all the memory is gone, whether it is a small business or individual. the current system that adds a lot of burden to people. so i laid out his vision that said what if we could clear everything up rather than coming back to them on the back and at the time they file, which is the simplest way to think about this? but i also recognize the things you said, which is this is something that would affect all the stakeholders in the tax

system from taxpayers to tax preparers to information return filers. the way we went about this is the way a public agency should go about this which is we held a series of public meetings, which i hosted with the stakeholders -- a broad range of stakeholders -- to get their input. and what we heard universally is a basically makes sense. we would all love to have everything works faster and the tax system. but we need to make sure we work through the details together in a constructive fashion so that we do not add burdens in the process. so what we are doing now is taking the next step and really developing detailed vision about what this would mean. i think there has been some misunderstanding. we have never suggested speeding up or adding more information reporting. we ask questions about what to people have now? when is it ready and when can

they get it to us? not, is there more or would they have to start doing what they already do faster off? we have asked ourselves internally, how our systems work and when could we do this kind of matching? >> let me ask you this before time is running up. how much will it upgraded system cost, to encapsulate all this, that would be needed to run the system? how many years would it take to build and test? you are justifying the budget in terms of the request that the congress would give to the president to run operations. >> this is a vision we are having a conversation with stakeholders' period first step is laying out exactly what it would mean. there is a bunch of things that we can do wrote -- right away. process things quicker. i can't tell you. there's no blueprint now. we laid out of vision. we had brought stakeholder

engagement and we're moving into the next round. >> would be safe to say you plan to have a proposal for congress to have feedback on as part of your vision? >> for sure, will help public proposals and will have plenty of time for interaction here >> thank you. we will recognize reanother representative for 5 minutes per >> thank you. commissioner, thank you for the work that you are doing, given the real budgetary constraints you are facing. if you will pass along to each and every one of your employees who are doing yeomans work, i cannot imagine the stress they are under given that you have thousands of americans waiting to connect with them on the phone who are waiting 10-20 minutes and many of them very unhappy that they have to wait that long. i think after two or three minutes, most americans tend to hang up on any phone call where they are having to be put on

hold. i hope we will get this done in a smart way. and i do not believe that the first thing we want to do is shortchanged agency, which already has a tough task and that is asking americans to voluntarily pay their taxes. we have responsible americans to do so to watch as others don't, it is very frustrating. we do not want to undermine the voluntary compliance record we have. please share with all the folks you work with that we thank them very much. tell the tournament over there, mr. williams, that we think -- we think floyd williams for all of his years of service. he has been a tremendous asset not just to congress but to the american people because of the service is provided to the irs and to us as the go-between betwen your agency and the congress. we are going to miss him and we want to say to you, thank you for all the services provided

over the years. one more thing? your and is in a context prepares. initiative on tax preparers. university of people that are represented themselves as competent, qualified repair and american tax return and get paid to do it. and we know there are some great ones, but there are some that have ripped off the american public. it is hard to believe that you need a license to cut someone's hair but you do not need a license to prepare the most important tax or financial documents. i thank you for the initiative to try to . dog that industry and make sure competent folks are preparing our taxes. i am distressed as i sit and listen to what you are saying here do loss 5000 employees. your budget was cut off. we know that when you do tax compliance enforcement that dollar you spend to have that investigator and those folks who

follow through to make sure people are complying with the payment of the taxes they owe it that you returned $6 for every $1 we invest. for us to be cutting $300 million dollars, it is distressing, because the last thing we want is the stories of how some overzealous tax agent goes and bust someone's doorstep to try to collect taxes. the truth is, for the most part, you have employees that do yeoman's work to help their fellow prepamericans. i hope it will sound the alarms on the ability for us to pay our taxes the right way voluntarily. my understanding and correct me if i am wrong that we now $385 billiont some is not paid in taxes that are avoided or intentionally not paid in this country. is that the estimate?

>> that is the tax gap estimate for tax year 2006. >> so that's more money. than we we would fund you for how many years? >> a lot. >> it's incredible. we have americans who are voluntarily paying their taxes. you have a bunch of other americans who are not doing what they should and so the responsible taxpayers in this country are having to cover for those who are not. and you can go out and figure out who they are, but -- if you have the enforcement money to go out there and find them. many of them makes simple errors. i think most americans are ready to pay their fair share. others are not. others are trying to send their money overseas and do things they should not. and we should make them pay their fair share. i hope we go out there and do

this the right way. is there any hope that with the funding that you are getting that you can fulfill everything that we are asking you to do? veryll, look, one is it's much the prerogatives of congress to fund us and whatever congress ends up giving us and we will do the best that weekend. i am quite proud of this agency delivering on multiple fronts. over the last several years, and especially this year, in a district budgetary environment. trying to balance compliance and service. and i think we are doing a good job. >> thank you. time is expired. ms. black is recognized for five minutes. >> thank you for being here. we're all talking about limited dollars. and we need to spend our dollars the best way we possibly can. i was reading a report just recently from the treasury

inspector general for tax administration who found billions of dollars in federal education credits that were issued in error. and what i am really trying to get here is to save, it to make sure we are giving the money to the people that deserve it so that we can use it in the budgetary process to fund those places such as yourself that can continue to do a good job. but it is very disturbing when i see here how much money this represents that was potentially given to those who do not deserve it. and i just want to read a couple of things out of that report. 1.7 million taxpayers received $2.6 billion in education credits for students for reform there was no supporting documentation in the irs files that they even attended an educational institution. almost 380,000 of these

individuals were not eligible because they did not attend the required amount of time or were post graduate students resolving -- resulting in $550 million in iran is a tax credit. -- in erroneous tax credits. credit.a double 250 prisoners iran is the receiveover $250,000. it was identified that a valid social security was required for federal student aid but not for these educational credits. that just blows me away. we were talking about the child tax credit at one of the other hearings. that was told to us that there was not a requirement that they have a social security number. i am not sure how you tracked that when you do not have a social security number being

used. but i want to go to trying to find ways to help you, one tools we can give you so you can have the authority to say we are not going to process this return. does not have the proper information on their. and the social security number seems like an easy thing for me. not sending it to a prison would seem like an easy thing. as well as making sure that they attended the classes or at least attended a college. perhaps maybe a valid school ein number would also help to make sure that when those credits are being processed that you have all of the information to verify that truly they qualify for those. can you help me out with that? >> sure. thanks for bringing it up and i appreciate the offer of help. we can always use help. a couple of things. one is that we have

significantly stepped up our efforts to crack down on fraud. last year was stopped $14 billion in potentially fraudulent or mistaken credits from going out the door. the specific report that you referenced, i want to point out. there was an inspector general report a couple years earlier that showed there was a huge error rate on the 1099, 1098's, which are the education reports we get. while they said the report said there could have been that level of fraud, there is a recognition that the documents they were using to match may not have been accurate documents. meaning the education institutions often cannot send in the right information so it is not always clear the student was not there, even though it came up. the answer to what we can get to help. if we want to block a credit because we think there is not right documentation.

if we do not have their authority, we have to go through a full-fledged audit which is resource intensive. even if we see an issue, if we do not have people who will follow up, and so the phone, in days with the text there, we cannot block it because we cannot change their return. if we have math error or authority tied to certain provisions, then we can block it and change the return without going through an audit. we requested in this budget math error authority for a couple of things. the second, prisoners. authorization for us to share information with prisons so that there can be punishment for a prisoner like losing privileges or putting in solitary confinement if they tried to defraud the system. our opposition in congress to actually share information back with prisons -- our authorization in congress and to share information with prisons. reupping that authorization will help. >> this authority, you need to

be given that by law. >> yes. >> we do have to change the law. if you have the authority to require that there be as a security number on that form? >> that is a different issue because certain tax credits you have to have a certain social security number. certain tax credits you do not carry the ones you are mentioning you do not. so it is not a requirement. people bring it up. so if congress decides the only people with social security numbers can get that credit, then that would be up to congress. >> ok. i know some ways we can help you. thank you. >> thank you. >> i apologize for our riding very late to this hearing. -- arriving very late. before i recognize mr. reid, i want to take a moment to recognize floyd williams for his 15 years of service at the irs. it is a total of 35 years of

government service. sir, we want to thank you as you move on to what i hope is a good retirement. thank you for your service. with that, mr. reed you are recognized. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. thank you, commissioner. i would like to explore -- i tried to rely on data and when we make decisions here in congress. one thing that i have a concern with is on the enforcement initiatives, you have certain projections on return of investment for those enforcement initiatives. i am sure you are familiar with the issue we are going to talk about here. 2013, you proposed enforcement initiative, return on investment would be 1.9-1. 2015, you project on the return on investment would be 4.3 to 1. historically, and i read some

reports that projected by 2012 it was supposed to be 7.8 return on investment to $1. do you confirm those numbers, those estimates, with actual data? and if you do, how do you do that? if you do not, why do not do that? >> >> question. great question. let me give you how i think about return on investment. first of all, we are very conservative in the numbers we give you. those are the people that we know do those job, a rolling 10 year average on the exact initiative. if we are going to hire 20 grade 13 examiners for an excise tax, we look at 10 year rolling average about how much revenue, gamow from those people making adjustments that comes into the

treasury. if they look back, 10 year rolling averages are those numbers. i think those understate the impact because the real game of running the tax system and the real objective is the $2.4 trillion dollars that comes in every year in which most of those people we do not engage with in that kind of activity. our job is to run a good service if so when people call they can answer our questions. compliance coverage, where there is the most risk, so that if you get an audit, your neighbors know that you get an audit iran specific issues and it drives voluntary compliance -- all round specific issues and it drives a voluntary compliance. $12 billion budget. $2.40 trillion in revenue. every dollar invested brings you 200. or a small way to look at it is we have our turk numbers, which are real dollars in the door every year. last year it was $55 billion.

a year before it was 57. and that is literally people go out, make an adjustment, but people go through the a judicatory process. that is a five to one return. the numbers you gave us are based on very specific activities in a granular way based on the kinds of people that do those activities looking back 10 years how does that tied to those terms of numbers? >> is it fair to say your testimony is that they are based on actual data when you go back and confirm the numbers? ? when you project the one. to nine1 for 20 -- the 1.9 to 1 for 2013, you'll be able to show us the actual data? >> i think will be able -- what i said was, i think it is very good numbers. it is a tenure rolling averages. i think things spike and they

moved so this is an estimate. so 2013 may not be exactly that. it might be higher or lower, but over the 10-year period, it will average about to be that amount. >> that is my question. in 2012, it was projected to be 7.8 to 1. was it 7.8? what was the number for 2012? >> i do not think you want to look at these things as year point in time, and you do not want to encourage us to do that. you want to encourage us to get the right resources that are going to drive the right taxpayer behavior. these numbers are once we certainly consult with the gao, omb on. i think we are very comfortable with these numbers and we have ongoing dialogue. >> you bring up a great point with gao. some of their materials are very concerned that you are not using actual data to confirm those projected return on investment

numbers that you are giving to us. >> i would not characterize it as very concerned. they said that together we can work on methodology. and we are having staff conversations on a regular basis to >> so you are working michio to come to some sort -- >> again, i feel very comfortable in our numbers. if anything they understate the return. i appreciate the work you do, commissioner. i appreciate all the work you do because it is a tough job carrot >> these are great questions because we need to be accountable for delivering results. >> i yield back. >> again, welcome. does the irs have available resources to tackle new enforcement responsibilities? new enforcement responsibilities. do you have the resources available to take on new enforcement response abilities? >> so earlier i was saying we tried to do the best we can with the budget that congress gives

us. obviously, we have a big job to do and we try to balance across the board all of the things that we do. we have requested in the 2013 budget some new resources for some of the new legislation that has come through and we are quite hopeful we will get that. >> in reviewing the president's 2013 budget proposal, this proposes saddling the irs with additional enforcement responsibilities by shifting alcohol tobacco tax and trade bureau duties of enforcing tax provisions related to alcohol and tobacco to the ira's with no funding allocated in this budget to pursue those kinds of violations. is that something that you have had internal discussions with others in the administration about? >> i am sorry, mr. chairman, what are you referring to? i do not think there is a major shift in the budget.

>> i think the 2013 budget proposes giving you an additional part -- enforcement responsibilities by shifting alcohol and tobacco and trade duties to the irs. >> i should get back to you on that because i do not think there is a shift proposed. in the past, we have been reimbursed to have some of our criminal investigators help them with some investigations and that is what i am aware of. >> if you could get me clarification on that, i would appreciate it. one other question. it has come to my attention, i have gotten a number of letters recently. we have seen recent press allegations that the irs is targeting certain tea party groups across the country, requesting what are described as onerous document requests, delaying approval for tax-exempt status. can you elaborate on what is going on with that? can you give us assurances that

the irs is not targeting particular groups based on political meanings? >> no. thanks for bringing this up. because i think there has been a lot of press about this and a lot of moving information so i appreciate the opportunity to clarify. first, let me start by saying yes, i can give you assurances. as you know, we pride ourselves on being a non political, non- partisan organization. i am the all, only me and our chief counsel are our only presidential appointees. and i have a five-year term that runs through presidential elections and just so that we will have none of that kind of political intervention in things that we do. organizations, which has been in the press, organizations do not need to apply for tax exemption. organizations can actually hold themselves out as 501c 4

organizations and a file 999 with us. -- a 990 with us. the organizations and the press are all ones that have banned in the application process. it is very important to emphasize that all of these organizations came in voluntarily. they did not need to engage the i am art -- are arrest in the back and forth. they could help themselves out,, filed a 990. the basic rules of around 501c4 organizations is that they have to be primarily engaged in promoting the general welfare of their community. they can be involved in campaign activity but cannot be their primary purpose. when people client for 501c4 status, what we do is engage them in a number of questions about making sure that we

understand their primary purpose are around this and engagement. and of what has been have been has been the normal back-and-forth that happens with the irs. none of the alleged tax payers, and i cannot talk about individual taxpayers, and i am not involved in these, are in an examination and application process which they moved into voluntarily. there is absolutely no targeting. this is the kind of back-and- forth that happens when people apply for 501c4 status. >> it is therefore -- is it fair to say there has been no change with irs practice in regard to what triggers audits and so forth with regard to taxes and organizations? >> so as a whole, we have audits based on risk criteria, coverage requirements, etc.. but in the area of political

activities, it just to make extra sure that folks are very insulated, we actually have a committee of three career professionals who are not based in washington d.c. that anytime an audit would be triggered because a potential political activity or but if there is a referral from a member of congress and other kinds of things that could be viewed as political, that group of three actually first looks at it. so no single individual can launch an audit. that there -- it has to the agreement among three. then the decision would be made for an audit based on resources, risks, allegations, facts. and it would be shipped out to an auditor to do the audit. that has been the practice for many years for anything to do with political activity. and that is the practice now. >> i thank you for your answer. dr. montgomery, do you want to

inquire? you may inquire. >> >> i have a lot of lgbt constituents and they had been approached me about the problems of dealing with the irs about how to file their income taxes and are having the experience of having more than noe sidorsky -- one source give them a different answer. and they are spending about twice as much as a married couple would spend it to get their income tax and done. they have got married under the law but suddenly the irs has got -- they ask questions about certain things, it is just not clear what the answer is. so i am wondering, is there any

single place or perhaps should there be a single place where they can call and find out the answer to a question or some place in the irs where somebody takes this issue and begins to give definitive answers? >> gerareat question. bunch.tried to do a this is a very complex issue for these taxpayers because under state law, these taxpayers have a different legal status and under federal law because of some of our federal laws. under state law, they often split the income but under federal law they have to file separately because of the federal laws. we recognize that there was a lot of confusion, and so we actually consolidated and put a group together who put out a set of of frequently asked questions

that answered a lot of these questions. so we realize that as laws have changed around the country, this has been an issue. we have been engaging with the community are around this. and i think we've clarified a lot of questions. let me just say, though, until you have state laws and federal laws recognizing couples the same way, this is going to remain difficult for people because some of the things people ask us to do we cannot do under the law. >> when they're filing theri federally,tax i suppose when you have different things under the state law, federal law, they cannot do it together. >> different states have different domestic partnership laws,but there's state returns often piggyback on federal returns but recognizing couples as couples is different depending on whether you are in

the state or depending which state in which federal laws are different. >> so that the piggybacking of the federal tax return works in reverse at the state level. it will have to change some state laws to actually make this rational. >> it adds complexity to these taxpayers filings. we have tried very hard to make sure we do our job like to do with all taxpayers which it we have to -- we get a team together. we tried to clarify what we could clarify. >> if i had a question, what number what i call? >> you'd dial our 800 number. >> and that number should get you to somebody who will give you the same answer day after day after day. you will not get two different answers? >> we tracked accuracy and consistency. they're always in the high 90's. >> i appreciate that.

it is an issue i hear from the district a lot and i want to know what it is that you have tried to do. and we will see if there are problems or need to do something about it. >> thank you. >> with your indulgence, commissioner, we have a follow- up question. >> mr. chairman, thank you for your -- for generously allow me to ask one last question. commissioner, two weeks ago, i sat down with my tax preparer and went over my taxes in preparation to file and he has been doing this for ever. he is licensed and all the rest. and he said to me, i was always supportive of what you're doing with regard to the tax preparers and trying to get us to be a more defined group so that way -- because he gets folks who come in to correct taxes that have been filed and probably by folks who prepared these things and did it the wrong way. he asked, it seems to me like a

lot of us who have done this for a long time are the ones being asked to go to the process to certify that we are competent. and i said to him, my sense is that everyone is going to be at some point touched by the irs as they moved afford to make sure that folks are competent to be out there representing themselves as qualified preparers of tax returns for money. chairman was gracious enough to indulge me, so i am wondering what you can tell us about the status of the initiative at the irs to try to help do the oversight of tax preparers and maybe respond to the question of who is being contacted out in the tax preparer world by the irs to follow up. he said he had to go through some courses or programs to test his qualifications and so forth.

so if you can give us a quick sense of where things stand. >> sure. first, similar to what i talked about with a real time system, this is a big initiative. we had multiple public hearings around the country, vetted it. put out regulations with what the public comment. we have had a lot of engagement with the prepare a community around us. because this is about partnering with the community to make sure taxpayers are served well. status is, we had 840,000 people tins -- d receive p prepare taxpayer identification number. 60% of those were not already enrolled agent, a cpa or a lawyer. now, and rolled agents, your preparer and cpa's and

lawyers, who had gone through their own set of competency testing and had ongoing continued education requirements, we are not required to take the test because they have taken the test or have a continuing education. your parents should not have had to take a test if he was already an enrolled agent. and so we have about 840,000 signed up. last fall, which started administering a, as the examination. and we have a number of people through that. one of our promises it was to the american people is that we were not going to cut out preparer services. we want to make sure people could still get service. there is a lot of competent preparers have been preparing returns a 20-30 years who have not taken a test and a wall. and so we gave them three years to pass the test. and people are starting to pass the test. you do not actually become a

registered tax return preparer and you pass the test if. so now people are starting to move to the test and we have had several thousand who have taken the test, and we expect that number to grow and we started approving continuing education providers. because this year continuing education requirements kick in. we are well under way. the last thing i would say is that this filing season we are actually -- we had ptins, we had caid processing everything faster, and so we were able to look at preparers who had really egregious problems with their returns, go after them immediately in late january with visits and phone calls and letters and released are to engage the committee to make sure they are treating taxpayers well. we are very pleased with the status of the initiative. >> thank you very much. >> you may inquire. >> i apologize i was late.

thank you for your testimony and the work you are doing. a lot of issues pending, but i had a chance to review the national tax payer advocate report. and i am sure you all at the irs do pay attention to that as well. some of the disturbing trends they see and that record is mainly the inadequacy of funding for the irs in order to do your job adequately, serve the citizens of our country. and in particular, they are concerned about because of funding cuts and the adequacy of resources, what that means to the irs ability to address the noncompliance issue. we have tax caps out there. the concern is that it will only grow wider. if there is a lack of confidence or belief in the irs when it comes to compliance, it will only exacerbate the situation. how i am concerned. you agree with the report in regard to enforcement of noncompliance?

>> we have budget cuts. and we tried to do the best we can with those budget cuts. we talked for a while before about service. we have not talked a lot about compliance. clearly, we are doing less exams carry and we have to find places. we are doing less collection activity. and it is going to result in less money coming in than otherwise. the big trend i am worried about is if we do not stem the tide in the 2013-2014 budget, is you get to a point where there is enough news about compliance rates being so low that still a lot of people are going to pay their taxes because they are honest, hard-working americans and they want to pay into the society they feel benefits them. but if people want to push the envelope, which some do and want to cut corners, if they think we are not on the job then they will do so. and so i think the general comments about you cannot have a

long-term trend of degrading compliance resources because there really starts to hit voluntary compliance, and i think the specifics of less funding means less dollars in the door. that is simple math. >> we are approaching the second anniversary of the passage of the affordable care. one of the provisions allows a tax credits to small businesses to provide health care coverage for their workers. 35% this year. supposed to go to 50% of integration of the exchanges in 2015. there are moments when small- business owners complain about the complexity of the tax credit. what is your opinion on that? and -- is that an item where the irs or us working with you can try to supply the process to make it easier for small businesses to qualify for that tax credit? obviously an's important tax credit for small businesses to help them afford paying for health coverage for

their workers, which is a key component of the affordable care act. i think it is a very complex credit. we have heard from practitioners and small businesses that the phase out around that and other issues have made it very hard for people to a, understand if they can hit the sweet spot where they get the credit and b, sometimes discourage people from actually taking advantage of the credit. the president's budget actually has a simplification proposal in it, which works on the phase out and other issues to make it hopefully much more attractive to small businesses and congress are taking up and passing that i think would be beneficial. >> you think that makes a lot of sense but the administration has looked at? in 2014, with the exchanges, there will be a lot of credits going for the individuals within the exchange market. is the irs making preparations in order to deal with that and

are you on track? >> yes. we are making preparations. we are on track. the majority of the work we are doing and the people we have had to hire a is to build the technology systems with the state exchanges and the federal exchange so that an estimated 30 million people can get $400 billion of tax credits. i testified yesterday before our corporations committee, and what i said to them is there is a heartfelt policy debate about the affordable care act and there are some members of congress to do not like it. there are members who like it, but the bottom line is come 2014, there will be a lot of constituents in every district to expect a tax credit when a shot at the exchange and we need to get funded appropriately in the 2013 budget to prepare for that. so we are on