Are you more likely to get audited by the IRS if you owe them money on your taxes?

Question

if so how big is the possibility? This was a discussion we were having at work during lunchtime .

Answer 1

Yip. IRS audit people who are high risk (eg people who they know already owe taxes) as these are the people who are likely to either not file all of their income or not file correctly. These are the people they are likely to make the most money off.

Answer 2

Not necessarily. If you massively underpaid your taxes it might be a trigger but the individual items in your return are more likely to trigger an audit if they are unreasonable or out of normal ranges.