HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.
![handle is hein.taxfoundation/ffbbexz0001 and id is 1 raw text is: FOUNDATION
Buffett's Facts Are Wrong: Top 1% Now Paying Record Level of
Taxes
Fiscal Fact No. 114
by Scott A. Hodge
December 13, 2007
Warren Buffett is at it again, trying to convince the American people that folks like him are
undertaxed. According to an Associated Press report,' Buffett appeared with Sen. Hillary
Clinton yesterday to warn of the dangers of a growing gap between rich and poor, and a tax
system that disproportionately helps people [he] called 'these super-rich'-himself included.
In the last seven-eight years what has happened is that the super-rich have gotten a huge
break, Buffett said.
Clinton added, There's a growing sense that it's [the tax system] not working for the average
American.
A ni'ew repor:!±y1--tlhiefoi e L essio.na--h[3udget (-{-fic-e2 shows that Buffett and Clinton have their
facts quite wrong. Indeed, the super-rich, the top 1 percent of households, are now paying a
record 27.6 percent of federal taxes3 and a record 38.8 percent of income taxes. By contrast,
the bottom 80 percent of households-representing 90 million households-pay 31.1 percent
of federal taxes and just 13.7 percent of income taxes.4
In other words, the top 1.1 million American households pay a greater share of the income tax
burden than the bottom 90 million combined. Indeed, as the chart below shows, it may not be
long until the wealthiest households will be shouldering a larger share of all federal taxes than
the bottom 90 million.
The chart shows clearly that the nation's tax burden has been gradually shifting away from
typical Americans to the wealthiest households since the early 1980s. Indeed, in 1979, the
bottom 80 percent of households paid a collective 43.5 percent of federal taxes compared to a](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.taxfoundation/ffbbexz0001&div=1&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)