LETTER TO THE EDITOR: “Kenneth M. Ralph [letter, Sept. 4] believes the top 5 percent of American earners do not pay their fair share of taxes. The facts tell a different story.
“In 2010, according to the Internal Revenue Service, the top 5 percent earned 35 percent of the country’s adjusted gross income and paid 59 percent of federal income taxes…” Fritz Stoner
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WATCHDOG: Mr. Stoner sets forth a basic misunderstanding held by conservatives. They measure only the contribution of income taxes by segments of the population. However, a more revealing barometer is how much the total load of taxes is shared and reveals that the top earners actually pay a smaller percentage of their income. Below is an explanation from the University of Southern California periodical:
“Wealth, Income, and Power…
People who have looked at this document in the past often asked whether progressive taxation reduces some of the income inequality that exists before taxes are paid. The answer: not by much, if we count all of the taxes that people pay, from sales taxes to property taxes to payroll taxes (in other words, not just income taxes). And the top 1% of income earners actually pay a smaller percentage of their incomes to taxes than the 9% just below them. These findings are discussed in detail near the end of this document…”
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This is one of the consistent misleading to the point of false statements that the anti-progressive taxation crowd tells. Good response.
KZ