Andrew, the base federal income tax rate for a middle class person is 28%.
The federal income tax in the US varies in rate based on income. The lowest
rate is 10%, the highest is 39%. Most middle class people pay 28%. On top of
that, EVERY American pays an additional 14% social security tax. If you're
employed, your employer pays half of it, and the other half of the SS tax
comes direct from the employees paycheck. If you're self employed, you pay
the full 14% yourself. It could be argued that even those who have jobs pay
the full amount since the employer could use that money to increase the
worker's pay. So, if you pay 28% income tax PLUS 14% social security tax,
that makes 42% for middle class Americans.
--
Chris Crawford
Photography & Graphic Design
Santa Fe, New Mexico
http://www.chriscrawfordphoto.com
http://www.plumpatrin.com Something the world NEEDS.
On 4/12/07 4:56 PM, "Andrew Fildes" <afildes@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> Not exactly. Here in Aus., in Canada and in Europe it is a 'goods and
> services tax' - we call it the GST. That means that we have a 10% tax
> levied not only on all goods except unprocessed foods but also on any
> service - such as paying a plumber or hairdresser. This replaced
> federal sales taxes on goods of varying rates which could be as high
> as 22% (as I remember) on luxury (unecessary) goods like cameras but
> was zero on food and books and similar good 'goods'.
> The principle was that in a tertiary, service based economy, we could
> no longer operate without taxing services.
> I am puzzled by some of your claims - giving the federal rate as 28%
> and then 42% for instance. I can't imagine murkins accepting 42% plus
> state taxes on top. Is there not a progressive taxation system there
> where those on minimum wage pay virtually no tax and the feelthy rich
> taking a bigger hit? And does not a significant proportion of those
> federal income taxes then get redistributed to the states as
> recurrent funding and project funding? We have an annual bunfright
> here where the states meet with the federal government to try and
> increase their proportion of the pie - the large states with smaller
> populations get proportionately more so the rest of us complain that
> we're subsidising them (and they're quite ungrateful too but it's fair).
> If all this is NOT the case, I'd recommend some serious social
> protestation. Not at the level of taxation (as usual) but the
> distribution of it.
> Andrew Fildes
> afildes@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
>
>
> On 13/04/2007, at 3:03 AM, Chris Crawford wrote:
>
>> (sales tax is like your VAT tax but the rate is lower, usually
>> around 6%),
>
>
>
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