Why Romney can pay a 15 percent tax rate
Romney's 15 percent is the going rate on capital gains and dividends, which is where he gets the bulk of his income (along with many others in the top income brackets).
This chart shows the distribution of "capital gains" income over different income levels. The top income levels have a much higher proportion of capital gains, which are taxed at a far lower rate than regular income.
Jared Bernstein/Tax Policy Center
Republican candidate Mitt Romney believes his effective tax rate—the share of his income he pays in federal taxes is around 15%, or, as he put it, “probably closer to the 15 percent rate than anything.”
Skip to next paragraph
Before joining the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities as a senior fellow, Jared was chief economist to Vice President Joseph Biden and executive director of the White House Task Force on the Middle Class. He is a contributor to MSNBC and CNBC and has written numerous books, including 'Crunch: Why Do I Feel So Squeezed?'
Recent posts
15% is the current rate on capital gains and dividends, which presumably comprise most of his income. The figure below, using data recently released by the Tax Policy Center, shows who mostly gets this type of income. To be clear, this is not yet the “bitter politics of envy”…so far, it’s just numbers.
Ordinary income, like paychecks, is taxed at a top rate of 35%, going to about 40% if the sun should ever set on the highend Bush cuts. The average effective rate for federal taxes these days is around 20%, about five points higher than Mitt’s. Basically, he’s paying what a middle class family—average income, around $65K, pays in federal taxes.
Is this a problem? Well, the fact that our tax code favors assets over wages is one factor behind the rise in income inequality. It’s also one reason we’re starved for revenues—this new report from the Joint Committee on Taxation shows that the favorable treatment of cap gains and dividends will cost the Treasury about $450 billion between 2011 and 2015 (that’s the whole American Jobs Act, right there!). Then there’s basic fairness…(whoops, straying from the numbers!)
And for what? The evidence doesn’t support the view that favoring asset-based income raises investment, productivity, or job growth.
Frankly, I doubt many people are envious about the above. I suspect few begrudge the wealth. What I think bothers people is the tax breaks on the wealth. And that’s more anger and disgust than envy. Just to be clear.
The Christian Science Monitor has assembled a diverse group of the best economy-related bloggers out there. Our guest bloggers are not employed or directed by the Monitor and the views expressed are the bloggers' own, as is responsibility for the content of their blogs. To contact us about a blogger, click here. To add or view a comment on a guest blog, please go to the blogger's own site by clicking on jaredbernsteinblog.com.
Become part of the Monitor community
36K on Facebook | 12K on Twitter | 2,250 on YouTube