In 2011, how many households in the U.S. according to the Tax Policy Center (TPC) earned $1 million or more dollars per year?

According to the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, (TPC) which is a joint venture of the Urban Institute and Brookings Institution, there were 433,000 tax units (individuals or families) reporting cash income greater than $1 million dollars in 2011. Seven thousand of those units, or 1.6% of all millionaires, owed no federal individual income tax.

TPC experts stated that the 7,000 individuals or families from the 433,000 that earned more than $1 million dollars did not pay federal taxes because they had great personal and financial calamities. The calamities reduced their taxes to zero. But as a matter of civics, was it still healthy for so many Americans to contribute nothing to the U.S. federal budget? If the federal budget is not properly funded, certain parts of America's defense, education, infrastructure, etc. are undeniably shortchanged.

In the U.S., the Alternative Minimum Tax was established to ensure that the rich paid taxes. Today, thousands of millionaires pay no taxes, and this is with the Alternative Minimum Tax in place. If these people are acting legally, then they have every right to lawfully reduce their tax burden. But, all Americans need to continuously worry about all the rich people and families who are zeroed out. And, the TPC must continue to ask if is it ever fair for non-millionaires (non 433,000 in 2011) to be the only ones always paying taxes.

More Info: www.theatlantic.com

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15 Comments

Deana Niceschwander Isaacks

if all income were taxed at 10% including millionaires and no loop holes more money would be raised and poorer people would not be paying as much which is as it should be. God ask for only 10% why should government ask more.

William Laughlin

billyboy915, Well done! 👏👏👏

Patty K

Scott, it's not just how much money you have, it's more of how much is your income. I know some people, whose only income is Social Security, that don't pay taxes at all because they they simply don't make enough to pay. Yet a person who works in fast food, who has very little in the bank, still has to pay taxes just because they make minimum wage!

lls

...gee, I'm surprised that we had that many in the U.S., back then. I have yet to see my own "million," anyway...

billyboy915

Scott, Flat rate taxes are punitive to the middle and lower classes, which is why a progressive rate works better. The fact is that the wealth gap in our country is increasing by leaps and bounds because of tax cuts for the top 1% that never seem to trickle down, even as far as the middle class, despite what the GOP say in order to pull one over on us. As of June 2019, the top 10 percent held 69.4 % of total U.S. net worth (that is the value of all assets a person holds minus all their liabilities).That means 90% of us hold a measley 30% of US wealth! To be in the top 10%, you need a net worth of at least $2,079,069.To be in the richest 20% of the US population, you need a household net worth of nearly $500,000. The top one percent of the usual income distribution holds over $25 trillion in wealth, which exceeds the wealth of the bottom 80 percent. That is more than all the goods and services produced in the U.S. economy in 2018. The GOP keep giving tax cuts to the rich, then taking us to war and inflating the military budget. To keep doing that, they attack social safety nets such as Medicare, Welfare, food stamps, etc. These are the very things the lower and middle classes depend on to stay afloat. Raising a progressive tax rate would not cause any hardship to the wealthy the way a flat rate harms the poor. BTW, Obama reduced the deficit by more than 2/3. That deficit was created by George W. Bush who cut taxes on the rich and then had no way for the 2 wars he started! Clinton eliminated the deficit created by the "fiscally responsible" Republicans, Saint Ronnie Reagan and George.H. W. Bush! After WWII, the US economy thrived and so did the American middle class because of a progressive tax scale that has all but disappeared today.

billyboy915

john, Perhaps there is some bloat in our government expenditures, but a large portion of that is d3dicated to our military industrial complex. The fact is that the wealth gap in our country is increasing by leaps and bounds because of tax cuts for the top 1% that never seem to trickle down, even as far as the middle class, despite what the GOP say in order to pull one over our eyes. As of June 2019, the top 10 percent held 69.4 % of total U.S. net worth (that is the value of all assets a person holds minus all their liabilities).That means 90% of us hold a measley 30% of US wealth! To be in the top 10%, you need a net worth of at least $2,079,069.To be in the richest 20% of the US population, you need a household net worth of nearly $500,000. The top one percent of the usual income distribution holds over $25 trillion in wealth, which exceeds the wealth of the bottom 80 percent. That is more than all the goods and services produced in the U.S. economy in 2018. Tell me again how taxing the rich "wouldn't cover 1/2 of the US federal budget."

drjafrank

Scott, Then you can imagine what Bernie Sanders would do!

Andrew Perlstein

I’m poor and I pay taxesScott,

Scott

Poor don t pay taxes, any individual or family regardless of size below the federal poverty level get credits. Less than 10% of taxpayers pay more than 80% of taxes. Flat tax will go long way in equalizing tax burdens, but cannot effectively impact the US debt of more than 22trillin and growing. Obama’s policies doubled the debt more than all previous 43 President s. Day of reckoning is in near future, keep some cash handy!

john

Good question.....stupid commentary. Of you dispossessed every one of the 1%ers of everything they owned, it wouldn't cover 1/2 of the US federal budget. That's not taxes....that's confiscating every penny they have. The problem is not the rich...it's idiots who have no clue what we're already spending in this country. Time to deal with the fact that government bloat is far more wasteful and costly to our programs than the relatively paltry taxes raised from "the rich."