Pressure is building on the federal income tax as the IRS loses staff and Trump keeps floating the idea of scrapping the tax — good news for taxpayers hoping for relief, risky for anyone who acts on fringe legal theories.

• The IRS has shrunk by about a quarter, from over 100,000 staff down to the mid-70,000s, with another 1,400 layoff notices and deep cuts to its IT and enforcement arms.
• Core tax systems still run on computers dating back to the 1960s, even as the people who maintain them are let go.
• Trump has repeatedly teased ending the federal income tax, and Rep. Thomas Massie has backed the idea that it could be done without Congress.
• Joe Bannister, a former IRS criminal investigator acquitted of tax felonies in 2005, holds that no law requires most Americans to file or pay — a position courts have consistently rejected, and one that carries real legal risk for anyone who follows it.
• Ending the tax would leave people with more money to spend, which could push inflation higher while also freeing up spending and investment.

Outlook: Expect more talk of cutting income taxes ahead of the midterms, but no sign yet of an actual move to end it — and the IRS, however thinly staffed, is still collecting.