The Majority of Income Taxes are Paid by the Top 3% of US Taxpayers

Posted on April 15, 2019

In fiscal 2018, the US government expects to bring in roughly $1.7 trillion dollars in income taxes, and this figure represents about half of all federal revenues. The top 1% of taxpayers paid 37.3% of all of the taxes that were collected. This amount was more than the bottom 90% of all taxpayers combined who paid a total of 30.5% of all of the taxes collected. The top 50% of all taxpayers paid 97% of the total income taxes that were collected. The top 0.001% of all taxpayers, representing about 1400 people, paid 3.25% of all income taxes. Tax rates paid by the very wealthy have fallen in recent years and this number is expected to fall even more because of the new tax law in 2018 and because the law’s biggest benefits go to top earners. The wealthy paid 24.1% in tax in 2013 and 22.9% in 2016. What is your tax rate?