This brief discusses the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) report titled Options to Improve Tax Compliance and Reform Tax Expenditures. The JCT report identified many options, including several to increase withholding.

This reports discusses tax gaps and withholding, and concerns and legislation regarding these issues in the 112th Congress.

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Confidentiality of alcoholic beverage reports submitted to the Comptroller under section 151.462 of the Tax Code.

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Transfer of a tax lien pursuant to section 32.06 of the Tax Code, and the items that may be secured by the transferred lien.

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Authority to operate a golf cart under section 551.403 of the Transportation Code.

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Process to appoint a person to fill a vacancy or to serve a subsequent term as a member of a board of directors of a regional mobility authority (RQ-0955-GA)

This report seeks to clarify why one group of individuals with disabilities may be eligible for benefits under Veteran's Disability Compensation (VDC), but ineligible for benefits under Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) (and vice versa), through a description and comparison of several distinguishing characteristics of the SSDI and VDC programs. This report concludes with a discussion of the challenges facing the administration of both programs, including processing delays for pending claims and appeals.

This report provides background information on the organization, practice, and funding of U.S. diplomatic security efforts. It also provides summary information on the September 11, 2012, attack on U.S. facilities in Benghazi, Libya, as well as on the subsequent Accountability Review Board.

Report exploring super Political Action Committees, what they are, how they developed, how much they raised and spent during the 2010 election cycle, and a preliminary analysis of the 2012 cycle.

This report provides data on the minimum wage that was changed, and it presents its nominal and real value.

This report discusses the federal proposal addressing multiple state insurance producer licensing requirements through the creation of a National Association of Registered Agents and Brokers (NARAB).

This report briefly summarizes and tracks congressional and State Department actions in response to the attack on U. S. facilities in Benghazi, Libya, and will be updated as necessary to reflect further developments and actions on ongoing policy proposals.

This report discusses the current law with respect to the loss of the federal pension of a Member of Congress for the conviction of certain crimes and the recent law to limit a former Member's receiving service credit toward a federal pension for any time served as a Member of Congress if that person is convicted of any one of a number of criminal offenses involving abuse of the public trust.

This report discusses the Child Support Enforcement (CSE) program that was enacted in 1975 as a federal-state program (Title IV-D of the Social Security Act) to help strengthen families by securing financial support for children from their noncustodial parent on a consistent and continuing basis and by helping some families to remain self-sufficient and off public assistance by providing the requisite CSE services.

This report discusses the financial assistance for global climate change initiatives in developing countries. The Global Climate Change Initiative (GCCI) -- one of the three main pillars to the 2010 directive -- aims to integrate climate change considerations into relevant foreign assistance, from FY2008 enacted funding request for FY2010 through the FY2014.

This report provides government-wide, multi-agency, and individual agency analyses of the President's FY2014 request as it relates to R&D and related activities. The President's budget seeks $142.773 billion for R&D in FY2014, a 1.3% increase (0.7% CAGR) over the actual FY2012 R&D funding level of $140.912 billion. Adjusted for inflation, the President's FY2014 R&D request represents a decrease of 2.6% from the FY2012 level (1.3% CAGR).

Revised report submitted by the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles containing background information on the department, and summaries of requests for appropriations and expenditures for the fiscal years 2014 and 2015 with supporting documentation.

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "In order to satisfy the requirement in the Ike Skelton National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2011 to report on the security of the southwest land border of the United States, we briefed Congress on July 12, 2011, with our preliminary observations. This is our final report to Congress on the Department of Defense (DOD) issues we addressed in response to the mandate. As directed by the mandate, we assessed: (1) what is known about the costs and benefits of an increased DOD role to help achieve operational control over the southwest land border, including the deployment of additional units, the National Guard, or other DOD personnel; increased use of ground-based mobile surveillance systems by military personnel; and use of additional mobile patrols by military personnel, particularly in rural, high-trafficked areas; and (2) what is known about the costs and benefits of an increased deployment of additional unmanned aerial systems and manned aircraft to provide surveillance; as well as the impact of any increased deployment of unmanned aerial systems or manned aircraft on national airspace use and availability.."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), a separately organized agency within the Department of Energy (DOE), has successfully ensured that the nuclear weapons stockpile remains safe and reliable by using state-of-the-art facilities as well as the skills of top scientists. Nevertheless, DOE’s and NNSA’s ineffective oversight of its contractors has contributed to many safety and security problems. As work carried out at NNSA’s sites involves dangerous nuclear materials such as plutonium and highly enriched uranium, stringent safety procedures and security requirements must be observed. In response to numerous serious safety incidents over several decades, DOE has taken steps to improve safety oversight. Recently, laboratory and other officials have raised concerns, however, that federal oversight has become excessive and overly burdensome. To address these concerns, DOE completed a safety and security reform effort to streamline or eliminate many DOE directives. However, GAO reported in April 2012 that the benefits of this reform effort are unclear because DOE did not determine if the original directives were, in fact, burdensome. In addition, the reform effort did not fully address safety concerns GAO and others identified in the areas of quality assurance, …

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) does not know the total amount its components invest in research and development (R&D) and does not have policies and guidance for defining R&D and overseeing R&D resources across the department. According to DHS, its Science & Technology Directorate (S&T), Domestic Nuclear Detection Office (DNDO), and U. S. Coast Guard are the only components that conduct R&D and, according to GAO’s analysis, these are the only components that report budget authority, obligations, or outlays for R&D activities to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) as part of the budget process. However, GAO identified an additional $255 million in R&D obligations by other DHS components. For example, S&T reported receiving $50 million in reimbursements from other DHS components to conduct R&D. Further, 10 components obligated $55 million for R&D contracts to third parties and $151 million to Department of Energy (DOE) national laboratories for R&D-related projects, but these were not reported as R&D to OMB. According to DHS, it is difficult to identify all R&D investments across the department because DHS does not have a department wide policy defining R&D …

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Future overseas contingencies are inherently uncertain, but effective planning for operational contract support can help reduce the risks posed by those uncertainties. The Department of Defense (DOD) has made an effort to emphasize the importance of operational contract support at the strategic level through new policy and guidance and ongoing efforts. For example, in January 2011, the Secretary of Defense issued a memorandum outlining actions and indicating a need to influence a cultural shift in how the department manages contracted support in a contingency environment. DOD has also recognized the need to translate strategic requirements into plans at the operational level, but GAO's past work has shown that DOD's progress in anticipating contractor support in sufficient detail in operation plans has been slow. As a result, DOD has risked not fully understanding the extent to which it will be relying on contractors to support combat operations and being unprepared to provide the necessary management and oversight of deployed contractor personnel. One way to help address this risk is to ensure military commanders and senior leaders are cognizant of the roles contractors have in supporting DOD's efforts and the …

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC)--a U.S. government corporation-- recognizes the importance of a disciplined, transparent, and accountable approach to tracking compact results. However, it reduced the scopes of its early transportation infrastructure projects and reports mixed success in meeting key performance targets. In addition, problems with data quality call into question the reliability of those reported results. GAO found the following for the seven compacts ending in 2010 and 2011, each with a road project or a port project. Road Projects: (1) MCC reduced kilometers to be paved under six compacts--Honduras, Cape Verde, Nicaragua, Vanuatu, Georgia, and Armenia--by a combined 63 percent (from about 1,800 to 600 km) because of increased construction costs and political problems in partner governments. MCC reported meeting reduced targets for five compacts. However, for three compacts, MCC did not consistently account for kilometers completed with funding from third parties. (2) MCC reported meeting revised targets for road roughness--a measure of pavement quality--for five of the compacts. However, reported data have quality issues, including the inconsistent application of measurement methodologies and calculation errors that resulted in overstated results. (3) MCC reported meeting …

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The number of people in the United States exposed to significant airport noise has steadily declined from roughly 7 million people in 1975 to about 309,000 today. This change reflects large decreases in the size of areas that are exposed to significant airport noise and is primarily due to improvements in aircraft technology."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) currently offers to Medicare providers and Medicare Administrative Contractors the use of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) Eligibility Transaction System (HETS) in a real-time data processing environment. HETS is operational 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, except during regularly scheduled maintenance Monday mornings, from midnight until 5:00 a.m., and when CMS announces other maintenance periods during one or two weekends each month. According to program officials, 244 entities were using HETS in 2012, including about 130 providers, 104 clearinghouses that provide data exchange services to about 400,000 health care providers, and 10 Medicare contractors that help CMS process claims for services. From January through June 2012, HETS processed each month an average of 1.7 million to 2.2 million queries per day with most of the queries submitted between the hours of 8:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m. eastern time. The users with whom we spoke confirmed that operational problems they experienced with the system in 2010 and the first few months of 2011 were resolved in spring 2011 after CMS implemented several …