Book excerpt: This Element is an excerpt from The Truth About Paying Fewer Taxes (9780137153862) by S. Kay Bell. Available in print and digital formats. How to keep from joining the 1% of U.S. taxpayers who get audited every year! Statistically, your risk of being audited is small. In 2007, for example, 1.4 million returns got a closer look from the IRS. But more than 140 million returns were filed that year. The raw numbers don't matter, though, if your return ended up in that 1 percent. So you don't have to spend time and money in connection with an audit, here are some ways to minimize IRS interest in.