Just to be a muckraker, I am going to toss this blurb out from an industry newsletter:
Quote:
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Some interesting facts from the IRS—in 2008 (the most recent complete year), the top 1% of filers paid 38% of all federal income taxes. To make the top 1%, you needed Adjusted Gross Income (AGI) of at least $380,354. The top 5% paid 58.7% of all of the federal and had AGI of at least $159,610. The top 10% paid 69.9% of all of the federal income taxes and had AGI of at least $113,799. On the other hand, the lowest 50% of the filers paid 2.7% of all the federal income taxes (this does not count those who did not have to file at all because of their income level). The next time that you hear that the “rich” are not paying their share, you should think about these numbers. They also illustrate the serious policy issue lurking in such a large percentage of the population receiving the benefits of government, but not paying taxes, but who also vote.
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