In 1980 the top 1% of income tax filers paid 19% of all federal income tax. In 2005 the top 1% of filers paid 40%. More here.
This is not the story you hear in the media or from campaigns. In fact, you hear the EXACT opposite...that the rich are getting richer on the backs of the poor...that the rich aren't contributing their fair share. It is hard to image political and media elites being any more divorced from reality.
And people believe it.
2 comments:
Worth noting: that info isn't consistent with the CBO's data:
http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/77xx/doc7718/SupplementalTables.xls
The numbers I report are for the distribution of income tax revenue only. CBO reports total effective tax rate--which is itself difficult to interpret and not entirely meaningful due the incidence of our complex tax code. For example, what % of corporate tax do consumers pay?
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