Are you guys following the IRS’s new Instagram page? Yeah, me neither. But we’re not 18 to 24 years old—the age group the agency is trying to target with its newest social media account.
Since it launched on Nov. 30, the IRS currently has 2,478 Instagram followers, who will find tax tips and information in graphic animation form in their feeds, in between photos of Ariana Grande promoting her latest music video and Ninja taking a photo with KISS.
And the IRS’s Instagram page is very pink.
Case in point, the IRS’s first post a few days ago that shows three flamingos in front of a pink background. The point of the post is to give Gen Zers a “heads up” to #GetReady for tax-filing season.
OK. Sure.
Then there was the agency’s second post (also with a pink background) of a chameleon changing colors, which indicates the recent changes to the tax law and how IRS Publication 5307 can better help you understand those changes.
In reality, I don’t think a flamingo extending its head high or a chameleon changing colors would grab the attention of a 12-year-old girl with her own Instagram account, let alone a 20-year-old who delivers Jet’s Pizza. Unless there are posts of a chimpanzee holding hundred-dollar bills and talking about how to get a bigger tax refund. Twenty-somethings might like that.
I’ll give the IRS credit, though, for trying something different and thinking outside its boring box to help young adults learn about taxes. The agency could have done Instagram posts of the “tax code page of the day” or “let’s see what’s in Charles Rettig’s desk drawer.”
But I wouldn’t be surprised to see the hashtag #IRSpetsofinstagram one day.
