Authors libby rittenberg 811
Bạn đang xem bản rút gọn của tài liệu. Xem và tải ngay bản đầy đủ của tài liệu tại đây (416.84 KB, 1 trang )
It is hard to imagine anything that has not been taxed at one time or
another. Windows, closets, buttons, junk food, salt, death—all have been
singled out for special taxes. In general, taxes fall into one of four primary
categories. Income taxes are imposed on the income earned by a person or
firm; property taxes are imposed on assets; sales taxes are imposed on the
value of goods sold; and excise taxes are imposed on specific goods or
services. Figure 15.6 "Sources of Government Revenue, 2007" shows the
major types of taxes financing all levels of government in the United States.
Personal Income Taxes
The federal personal income tax is the largest single source of tax revenue
in the United States; most states and many cities tax income as well. All
income tax systems apply a variety of exclusions to a taxpayer’s total
income before arriving at taxable income, the amount of income that is
actually subject to the tax. In the U.S. federal income tax system, for
example, a family deducted $3,200 from total income earned in 2005 for
each member of the family as part of its computation of taxable income.
Income taxes can be structured to be regressive, proportional, or
progressive. Income tax systems in use today are progressive.
In analyzing the impact of a progressive tax system on taxpayer choice,
economists focus on themarginal tax rate. This is the tax rate that would
apply to an additional $1 of taxable income earned. Suppose an individual
was earning taxable income of $8,025 and paid federal income taxes of
$802.50, or 10% of taxable income (we are ignoring exemptions that
would eliminate taxes for such an individual). If the taxpayer were to
receive $100 more of taxable income, however, that $100 would be taxed
at a rate of 15%, the rate that applied in 2008 to taxable incomes between
Attributed to Libby Rittenberg and Timothy Tregarthen
Saylor URL: />
Saylor.org
811
