47% of Americans pay no income tax. You read it right the first time. That is to say, they are refunded ALL of the tax they paid in, and some even get MORE than they paid, due to earned income credit or child credits.
i qualify for a number of credits but i'm not finding it very easy to read the methodology of how that 47% number came about. i certainly won't claim i qualify for low-income credits, so if that is truly where that number comes from i can accept it. although that means that there are 80 million or so people living at or below the poverty line....

"The RIAA has shown a certain disregard for the creative people of the industry in their eagerness to protect the revenues of the record companies." -- Frank Zappa
"That's the trouble with political jokes in this country... they get elected!" -- Dave Lippman
"That's the trouble with political jokes in this country... they get elected!" -- Dave Lippman
what does it mean to "pay no federal income tax"?
18/09/2012 06:30:28 PM
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Wrong
18/09/2012 06:37:07 PM
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Additional categories
18/09/2012 06:51:46 PM
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SS income is very much taxed, my friend
18/09/2012 06:59:28 PM
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ok
19/09/2012 05:46:49 AM
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Is that true?
18/09/2012 06:54:33 PM
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No, it's not. See my post (you should really have read it first
) *NM*
18/09/2012 07:00:07 PM
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Looking at that chart you linked, I have some questions.
18/09/2012 07:05:24 PM
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I think the reasoning is that since they go to entitlement programs, it's not entirely a tax.
18/09/2012 10:55:12 PM
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Does that mean the correct number is that 27.6%?
18/09/2012 07:17:46 PM
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That is correct - some folks have such negative income taxes, it offsets payroll as well.
19/09/2012 05:28:07 AM
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If it helps, here's a graph of effective federal tax rate by quintile, all taxes (data from 2007)
19/09/2012 08:30:37 AM
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While we're talking about taxes, am I the only one who doesn't give a rat's ass about Romney's?
18/09/2012 10:37:12 PM
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That sort of thing does matter to me
18/09/2012 10:48:30 PM
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Ah, yeah, not so much for me.
18/09/2012 11:16:56 PM
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I am a BIT curious whether he took the IRS amnesty for tax dodging in 2009.
18/09/2012 11:32:31 PM
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As an outside observer ...
19/09/2012 01:28:13 AM
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Re: As an outside observer ...
19/09/2012 04:45:11 AM
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the question of legality has already been covered by the offshore accounts though....
19/09/2012 05:44:28 AM
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Eh, those already exist, if people bothered to look
19/09/2012 08:08:35 AM
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Those are toothless examples, no bite to them and old news so no shock value aspect
19/09/2012 08:44:01 AM
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The stat is valid, because of tax credits the GOP created/expanded for the overtaxed middle class.
18/09/2012 11:22:13 PM
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I think you got it wrong:
19/09/2012 01:52:30 AM
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+1 - you are correct, moondog screwed the pooch with this post. *NM*
19/09/2012 05:18:19 AM
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Washington Post similar to Anonymous', but shows how many people get each credit.
19/09/2012 06:45:08 PM
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