Tax the Rich? 14 Facts You May Want to Consider
#1. The top 1 percent of all income earners already pay 39.5 percent of all federal income taxes.
#2. When you take all forms of federal taxation into account, the top 1 percent of all income earners pay 28.1 percent of all federal taxes.
#3. The top 20 percent of all income earners in the United States pay approximately 86 percent of all federal income taxes.
#4. One recent poll found that 64 percent of Americans are in favor of raising taxes on those that make $250,000 or more a year in order to help balance the federal budget deficit. Another recent poll found that 72 percent of Americans favor raising taxes on those making $250,000 or more a year.
#5. Approximately 45 percent of all U.S. households pay absolutely no income taxes at all.
#6. Overall, U.S. households are now receiving more income from the U.S. government than they are paying to the government in taxes. This is clearly not anywhere close to sustainable.
#7. During 2010, the U.S. government paid out a combined $2.3 trillion in unemployment benefits, Social Security benefits, disability insurance, Medicare benefits, Medicaid benefits, benefits for veterans, education assistance and other direct transfers of cash from the government to individual citizens.
#8. 59 percent of all Americans now receive a government payout of one form or another.
#9. The ultra-wealthy keep much of their wealth outside of the United States so that the government cannot tax it. It has been estimated that a third of all the wealth in the world is held in “offshore” banks.
#10. Thanks to new corporate tax cuts in Japan, the United States now has the highest corporate tax rate in the developed world.
#11. Large corporations have become masters at avoiding taxes. Back in the 1950s, corporate taxes accounted for about 30 percent of all federal revenue, but in 2009 corporate taxes accounted for just 6.6 percent.
#12. General Electric has been a great friend to the Obama administration. According to the New York Times, General Electric made a total of 14.2 billion dollars in profits last year. So how much did they pay in taxes to the U.S. Treasury? According to the New York Times, not one penny was paid.
#13. Even though Boeing receives billions in federal subsidies every year and even though it has a bunch of juicy government contracts it did not pay a single penny in federal corporate income taxes from 2008 to 2010.
#14. Exxon-Mobil paid $15 billion in taxes in 2009, but not a single penny went to the U.S. government. Meanwhile, their CEO brought in over 29 million dollars in total compensation that year.
(Source: semifreepolicestate, via disobey)
