The medium-term policy statement (MTPS), November 2021, of the South African Minister of Finance, Enoch Godongwana, suggested that through improved systems of revenue collection, the South African Revenue Service (SARS) collected an additional R50 billion during the 2020/2021 financial year. The Commissioner of SARS, Edward Kieswetter, suggested that Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) methods improved tax revenue collection and saved SARS an additional R30 billion in illicit tax returns. This paper reflects on the means and measures of these technologies to manage fiscal policies efficiently. The paper aims to review explanatory theories of technological innovation and its impact on extractive systems, such as that of the developing political economy of South Africa. The focus of the research will be on SARS, but with an appropriation of the theory to the more extensive bureaucratic architecture of the state. The