What’s a fair share?
by digby
When this issue of the 47% not paying any federal income taxes (who also, apparently are the only ones voting for Barack Obama) came up in the GOP primary, Romney complained that “everyone needs to pay their fair share.” Coming from a man who refuses to tell the American people whether he’s paid his fair share is pretty rich.
Here’s a good chart that explains how this breaks down:
When reporters inquired of the campaigns what should be done about these tax expenditures (which they all agreed were a encouraging all these parasites to slack off … and vote for the Democrats so they could keep their cushy existences at the expense of everyone else) here’s how they responded:
Pressed on how they would bring more people into the tax system, none of the top three campaigns offered details. Alice Stewart, a spokeswoman for Mrs. Bachmann, said the Minnesotan “believes that the tax code is too complicated and must be reformed to be fairer and flatter.”
Campaign spokeswoman Gail Gitcho said Mr. Romney “is opposed to tax increases,” adding he would produce his economic plan in the fall.
“Governor Perry wants more people on the tax rolls not by raising taxes or expanding the tax base, but by putting people to work,” said Perry spokesman Mark Miner.
Profiles in courage, there. It would seem that the Republicans are using this purely as a divisive tactic. Even some of their own intellectuals disagree with it:
Kevin Hassett, director of economic policy at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, said the GOP candidates were wrong to assume that working-class voters support government programs because they are free.
Poorer households pay disproportionate shares of what Mr. Hassett calls stealth taxes on gasoline, alcohol and cigarette, even lottery tickets. They may get back in Social Security and Medicare benefits more than they pay in payroll taxes, but that is cold comfort for struggling young workers trying to buy a house, he said.
Well, that’s crazy.They’re so bad, they don’t even deserve representation in the government. Especially the kids and old people. They’re just a bunch of losers who need to stop being “takers” and give something back to the “makers.” This is just as it was in the good old days. Of feudalism. They used to call it “tribute” but we can modernize it a bit and call it”paying their fair share.”
Low-income households as a group do, in fact, pay federal taxes. Congressional Budget Office data show that the poorest fifth of households paid an average of 4.0 percent of their incomes in federal taxes in 2007, the latest year for which these data are available — not an insignificant amount given how modest these households’ incomes are; the poorest fifth of households had average income of $18,400 in 2007. The next-to-the bottom fifth — those with incomes between $20,500 and $34,300 in 2007 — paid an average of 10.6 percent of their incomes in federal taxes.
Moreover, even these figures greatly understate low-income households’ total tax burden because these households also pay substantial state and local taxes. Data from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy show that the poorest fifth of households paid a stunning 12.3 percent of their incomes in state and local taxes in 2011.
When all federal, state, and local taxes are taken into account, the bottom fifth of households pays about 16 percent of their incomes in taxes, on average. The second-poorest fifth pays about 21 percent
We don’t know what Mitt’s been paying in taxes all these years, but we do know what he paid in 2010: 13.9%
