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The average one percenter has a 23% effective tax rate, double the average (which is 12%). http://taxfoundation.org/blog/top-one-percent-pays-twice-income-tax-

by nickff 13y ago

The average one percenter has a 23% effective tax rate, double the average (which is 12%). http://taxfoundation.org/blog/top-one-percent-pays-twice-income-tax-rate-all-taxpayers http://taxfoundation.org/blog/top-one-percent-pays-twice-inc... edit: dragonwriter correctly pointed out that the numbers mentioned above are actually 'income tax', not 'total tax'. I apologize for my vagueness. edit: the average total effective tax rate for one percenters is 27.9%, compared to the lower 99%, who pay an average of 27.5% TETR http://www.ctj.org/pdf/taxday2012.pdf http://www.ctj.org/pdf/taxday2012.pdf

ItendToDisagree 13y ago
Two questions. Do they actually end up paying that tax rate? Or is that before deductions and only the rate on their personal earned income. There are a lot more ways to game the tax system when you have a great deal of wealth. What percentage of the wealth do they have relative to everyone else?
- refurb 13y ago
  The definition of "effective tax rate" is what they actually paid.
  - ItendToDisagree 13y ago
    But not in this case... which is why I asked. The parent has updated their post to show this. The quoted number was only their income tax rate.
    - refurb 13y ago
      This might help then.... http://blogs.wsj.com/wealth/2012/04/18/the-real-tax-rates-of-the-rich/ http://blogs.wsj.com/wealth/2012/04/18/the-real-tax-rates-of...
dragonwriter 13y ago
> The average one percenter has a 23% effective tax rate, double the average (which is 12%). Even assuming that there are no errors or misrepresentations in the material from the anti-taxes-on-the-rich propaganda outfit you cite, even they don't claim that. While they certainly count on people to conflate "effective income tax rate" with "effective tax rate" (or even "effective rate of taxation on income"), they carefully restrict their claim to "effective income tax rate". Income tax isn't all of tax, or even (despite the name) the only (or, even, for most wage earners, the most significant) tax on income.
- nickff 13y ago
  You are correct, I edited the post to include total effective tax rate for the top 1% and bottom 99%.
thedufer 13y ago
Thats specifically only income tax. At under $117k, people are paying 12-13% in social security; at the high end it approaches 0% thanks to the hard ceiling. Its kind of disingenuous to compare taxation on high earners vs average but ignore regressive taxes.
mcguire 13y ago
And the "average tax rate for the bottom 99%" is 9%. 1. Mean vs. median. Here be dragons. 2. That roughly corresponds with my experience: it's easy for a USA'er to compute their federal effective income tax rate: the IRS's idea of your income is at the bottom of the first page and the "total tax paid" is about two-thirds of the way down the second. Mine was around 15% for many years; it has gone up lately, but I don't remember specific numbers any more.

by nickff 13y ago

ItendToDisagree 13y ago

Two questions. Do they actually end up paying that tax rate? Or is that before deductions and only the rate on their personal earned income. There are a lot more ways to game the tax system when you have a great deal of wealth. What percentage of the wealth do they have relative to everyone else?

refurb 13y ago
The definition of "effective tax rate" is what they actually paid.
- ItendToDisagree 13y ago
  But not in this case... which is why I asked. The parent has updated their post to show this. The quoted number was only their income tax rate.
  - refurb 13y ago
    This might help then.... http://blogs.wsj.com/wealth/2012/04/18/the-real-tax-rates-of-the-rich/ http://blogs.wsj.com/wealth/2012/04/18/the-real-tax-rates-of...

dragonwriter 13y ago

> The average one percenter has a 23% effective tax rate, double the average (which is 12%). Even assuming that there are no errors or misrepresentations in the material from the anti-taxes-on-the-rich propaganda outfit you cite, even they don't claim that. While they certainly count on people to conflate "effective income tax rate" with "effective tax rate" (or even "effective rate of taxation on income"), they carefully restrict their claim to "effective income tax rate". Income tax isn't all of tax, or even (despite the name) the only (or, even, for most wage earners, the most significant) tax on income.

nickff 13y ago
You are correct, I edited the post to include total effective tax rate for the top 1% and bottom 99%.

thedufer 13y ago

Thats specifically only income tax. At under $117k, people are paying 12-13% in social security; at the high end it approaches 0% thanks to the hard ceiling. Its kind of disingenuous to compare taxation on high earners vs average but ignore regressive taxes.

mcguire 13y ago

And the "average tax rate for the bottom 99%" is 9%. 1. Mean vs. median. Here be dragons. 2. That roughly corresponds with my experience: it's easy for a USA'er to compute their federal effective income tax rate: the IRS's idea of your income is at the bottom of the first page and the "total tax paid" is about two-thirds of the way down the second. Mine was around 15% for many years; it has gone up lately, but I don't remember specific numbers any more.