They still pay in %age of taxes more than their %age of income, at least according to the 2008 figures from the IRS. Probably not wealth, but this is an income tax and not a wealth tax, so that is sorta a given.
Before anybody pounces on this, negative share of Fed INCOME taxes.
Where's that number? I find it pretty unlikely. It was exactly what Warren Buffett was challenging his fellow billionaires about in
2007. So far I haven't heard of any takers; "I'll bet a million dollars against any member of the Forbes 400 who challenges me that the average (federal tax rate including income and payroll taxes) for the Forbes 400 will be less than the average of their receptionists."Here's a piece by politifact-
Politifact agrees that these 400 are paying less of a percentage than the 29K workers-- if you include SS & Medicare taxes. [and why wouldn't you-- it isn't like they let you opt out of them.]
Jim
And they start losing itemized deductions and other perks around that, too. ALso, they run into the AMT more often. Plus the lower groups are able to take advantage of credits, many of which were passed specifically to address things like the SS tax differential. (The bottom two percentiles actually pay a negative share of income taxes which indicates this "rebate"). Remember that these are skewed somewhat by the fact that 47% of households pay no fed income tax. The CBO's "share of fed tax liabilities for all households by comprehensive household income quintile" in 2006 (the latest I could find) showed that the share of TOTAL Fed tax liabilities for the top 1% was 28.3% (up from 15.4% in '79 for those playing at home). This included not only share of individual income tax liabilities, but also Social Insurance, and excise taxes. CBO stats from Pre-Tax Income Shares All Households, by Household Income Category, 1979-2006, show the top 1% has 18.8% of pre-tax income (which seems to me anyway a better metric than after tax). So, with less than 20% of the income they they pay about 28.% of ALL fed taxes. If you have anything that even begins to suggest how state taxes fit into all this, feel free to tell me.
-snip-
I haven't seen anything since the early 90s that even began to address taxes other than Fed. Income Tax. [and a lot of the figures then were
20 years old.] The burden the lowest earners pay in sales, use, excise, and property taxes varies all of the map from state to state.Not one to usually attribute to malice what can be explained by stupidity-- I suspect the tax situation is kept impossibly complicated by design.
No matter what is politically expedient to say in a particular situation. . . you can pick out some facts to support it.
Jim
I am not so sure. The tax situation is driven by politics, but no surprise there. So things are tacked on to please someone or, even more often, one person wants to tack on something which requires tacking on multiple other things designed to get votes instead of make things easier. Add to that inertia as things are tacked on to things that were tacked on earlier but not removed, and you have what we laughingly call a tax "system".
The last sentence says it all. When they talk about "deficit or surplus" they include SS ... well they did when SS was a surplus. Now I suppose they want to sequester it again.
I liked that, too. The translation is: SS is treated as though it were a part of the budget, except when it isn't." (grin).
The 50 billion dollar short fall has made it less attractive as a budget item.
Huh? Pretty good deal? You ask me, it's confiscatory!
I do not know why they don't implement my "Flat-Flat Tax" methody.
You know what the "Flat Tax" is all about; I take it one step further.
Assume (round numbers) we have 300,000,000 folks and the federal budget is $3 trillion. That's $10,000 each.
Send it in.
"Ah," you might say, "what about the poor person who doesn't HAVE $10,000 with which to pay her taxes?" I admit this is sort of a conundrum, but I think I've figured that out also.
Blood platelets.
This person could donate a unit of blood platelets each month and the government would credit her with $1000 toward her taxes. I call this the "Tax Withdrawal Program."
"Okay, smarty-pants, what about the unmarried mother of four, each under five years of age? She can't give FIVE units of blood platelets a month and we certainly are not going to drain her children!"
True, but there are alternatives.
One kidney.
A kidney on the open market is easily worth $100,000. She'd have her and her brood's taxes paid for two full years. After two years, she could contribute a cornea, and so on. By the time she ran out of spare parts, her snowflakes would be having broods of their own.
HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.