Why It Matters

A recent Congressional Research Service (CRS) report published September 21 Policymakers are facing a critical blind spot because they currently lack IRS data for tax years 2023, 2024, and 2025 due to the three-year publication lag in the IRS Statistics of Income program. A new Congressional Research Service (CRS) report maps the landscape of tax statistics available to lawmakers.

The Big Picture

The IRS publishes tax data broken down by state, congressional district, county, metropolitan and micropolitan area, and ZIP code. Most subnational tabulations follow an annual release cycle with a three-year delay. As of the report's publication, the most recently released subnational tax data covers tax year 2022, released in late February 2025.

The IRS tracks population movement through year-to-year address changes on tax returns, producing inflow and outflow data by state and county with a two-year delay. That data goes back to 1990.

State-level estate tax tabulations by filing year arrive annually with a two-year delay, while year-of-death tabulations appear every three years with a five-year delay. However, some IRS estate tax year-of-death files are mislabeled and hosted in the wrong location on the IRS website, creating navigation challenges for researchers and staff.

The IRS received filings covering approximately 214 million adults for the 2022 tax year. The U.S. Census Bureau estimated the adult population at over 257 million as of 2022, leaving a gap of roughly 43 million adults not captured in IRS data. This gap exists because many individuals are not required to file individual income tax returns.

The IRS is legally required under 26 U.S.C. §6103 to protect individual taxpayer confidentiality, which means income items with fewer than 20 returns in a local area are excluded entirely from published tables, and fewer than 10 returns at the state level trigger similar exclusions. Tax data is assigned to geographic areas based on the address listed on the tax return, which may not reflect a taxpayer's actual residence. Congressional district assignment relies on ZIP codes, which can introduce imprecision.

The Bottom Line

Access the Legis1 platform for comprehensive political news, data, and insights.

Spot something wrong? Report an issue with this article