Watching the news these days… argulumph! That was some strange sound of annoyance, frustration, and exasperation coming from me. Bottom line question, what will happen with the tax code?
Beats me. 6 months ago I would have bet on pretty massive changes, but now I’m not so sure. Every day there’s another talking point, and in this politically hyper-charged environment, I just don’t see anything much happening. Here’s hoping I’m wrong. Our tax code is a mess and really needs some pretty massive reforms.
Here are some “tax facts” for you. See what I did there? 🙂 These are based on the latest IRS data.
- The top 1% of income earners (adjusted gross income $480,930+), pay about 39% of federal income taxes. That means about 892,000 Americans are paying 39% of all federal income taxes.
- The top 10% of income earners, (adjusted gross income $138,031+), pay about 70.6% of federal income taxes.
- About 1.7 million Americans, less than 1 percent of our population, pay 70.6 percent of federal income taxes. That’s right, if your family income is over $138,031, you are a 1 percenter!
- The bottom 50 percent of income earners (adjusted gross income $39,275 or less) pay 2.83 percent of federal income taxes.
- Thirty-seven million tax filers have no tax obligation at all. The Tax Policy Center estimates that 45.5 percent of households will not pay federal income tax this year.
Alrighty then, back on point. I’d like to tell you what’s in the new tax plan, but until there actually IS a new tax plan FROM CONGRESS, we all need to work under the assumption that our government will do what they are best at … nothing.