To give you some hard numbers... in my last full year in Silicon Valley I made $383K in total compensation. I paid $112K in federal income tax and $43K in Cali

To give you some hard numbers... in my last full year in Silicon Valley I made $383K in total compensation. I paid $112K in federal income tax and $43K in California state tax. The mandatory pension scheme in the United States, which is called Social Security, tops out at about $5K. (It's not a major tax for high earners.) I also paid $6K in Medicare tax. (I think my employer paid a matching amount for both of these, but I'm not 100% sure.) So my take home that year was about $260, so I paid about 33% overall in taxes. Both Federal and California tax rates have increased since I left, so I might have paid a little more if I had an identical income this year.