At the Federal level, it is more useful to talk about net taxes of all types. That is, taxes of all types paid to the Federal government (income, excise, payrol

At the Federal level, it is more useful to talk about net taxes of all types. That is, taxes of all types paid to the Federal government (income, excise, payroll/social, etc) after subtracting all transfers and distributions to the taxpayer. This is a more accurate accounting of the situation. It paints a slightly different picture, but not that different. It turns out that only about 20% of taxpayers send more money to the government than they receive in aggregate across all forms of taxation and transfers. Another 20% of taxpayers roughly pay their own way, providing about as much tax revenue as they receive in transfers. 60% of taxpayers receive more in transfer payments and other distributions than they pay in taxes (not that surprising with things like Social Security). tl;dr: across all Federal taxes and transfer payments taken as net, 20% of taxpayers are paying taxes that are transferred to 60% of taxpayers. Individual States have diverse taxation structures, so the net taxpayer statistics likely vary widely.