For the first time on record, the 400 wealthiest Americans paid a lower tax rate

My point is that the even the more taxes they pay, they're not enough. They should pay way more than the poor, not merely more.

but our annual raise are often in line with inflation should they be excluded? what about sales tax, thats directly effected by prices going up, should that be excluded to. and what about the receivers of these payment, its the hotdog I paid for is taxed already then why should the vendor have to pay tax again? there is no end to it. this whole distinction of earned & 'gained' income is farce and created just to favor wealthy class. I home more 'commoners' see that.

> Gains from HFT would not be LTCG (held less than a year), so it would be taxed at ordinary income rates.

that may be, but my argument is that it should be taxed higher not lower for discouraging the activity. and what about the hedge funds clients that primarily benefit from HFT, should they have tax breaks for holding that capital in fund for long term?

At least when a wealthy person dies it's easier to count their wealth because there are strong incentives on the parts of the people who stand to inherit their wealth to make sure it's all counted correctly.

This misunderstands the point of indexing gains for inflation, or applying a lower rate to income that is mixed with inflation. The point is that you pay tax on the income in the year it is earned (or soon thereafter). It doesn't matter what the money was earned for, whether you got a raise, or anything else. The point is that it's all money that you just got right now. It's different when you are taxed on a mix of "real" gains (in the economic sense) and inflation.

- Wages $4M (Min $38K, Max $375K, Mean $179K) (Excludes FICA and 401(k) contributions.)

- Total income $4.3M (Min $39K, Max $377K, Mean $195K)

- AGI $4.3M (Min $38K, Max $377K, Mean $194K)

- Taxable income $3.4M (Min $26K, Max $325K, Mean $156K)

- Tax $742K (Min $3.8K, Max $81K, Mean $34K)

- Overall effective tax rate (tax/AGI) is 17.4% (Min 5.5%, Max 23%)

Marginal tax bracket has been as low as 15% and as high as 33%. Some specific years:

- In my lowest income year, I had total income of $39K (AGI $38K) and paid $3.8K in taxes (10%).

- In my highest income year, I had total income of $378K (AGI $377K) and paid $81K in taxes (21.6%)

- In my highest tax year, I had total income of $341K (AGI $341K) and paid $76K in taxes (22.3%).

- One year I had total income of $151K (AGI $146K) and paid $14K in taxes (10%).

- Another year I had total income of $127K (AGI $117K) and paid $6.4K in taxes (5.5%).

Married filing jointly for all years. Spouse has had no income since 2000. Two kids since 2003. Since 2004 I've lived in a state which currently has a flat income tax of 5.5%. With SALT, mortgage interest, and charitable contributions, I've itemized every year. Last year it barely made sense to itemize, and this year I'll probably be right on the itemize line again.

Including SALT, I estimate my total effective tax rate at around 30% most years. I'd have to do some math to figure out how much sales and other non-SALT taxes are as a percentage of income.

I'm a tech worker with a CS degree. I've been lucky with my career. One startup I joined circa 2000 made it to an IPO and was acquired by an F100. Another startup I joined was acquired by a public company which itself was acquired by an F100. Salary a few years into my career has been in the $125K - $200K range and bolstered by ISOs, ESPP, and RSUs.

We're fortunate we can accord to put our kids through college. I expect to spend about $150-$200K total for both in a state school.

Tangent:

I would pay more in taxes for a stronger social safety net. Retirement is more than a decade off, but I'm counting on Social Security for 25-50% of our retirement income, and Medicare for health insurance. We'll do fine in retirement, but in retrospect, I wish I had been saving even more each year. Having SS tax uncapped (no wage base) in return for higher payout is a tradeoff I'd make. I don't see any reason to tie SS to wages and not total income (include capital gains and dividends).

In general, I think there's too much reliance on the stock market for retirement. The mishmash of retirement plans we have in the U.S. is crazy. The 401(k) only came about due to some Kodak executives lobbying for a special exemption in the tax code. The deduction limits are arbitrary (why does a 401(k) allow almost 4x the deduction of an IRA). Expecting your average person to save for their own retirement is a lot to ask. My parents certainly never figured it out (both still working in their 70s). "How to save for retirement" wasn't a course I had in school. Even if (say) you're diligent enough to set aside 25% of your income each year into a target retirement fund and retire at 65, how well you do in retirement is still up to the whims of the stock market and how smartly you invested. Because most people don't have significant earnings till later in their careers, compounding isn't as valuable individually as it is collectively. And yet, corporations and governments haven't been reliable guarantors of retirement pensions. I don't really have an answer.

[1] According to https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/08/12/upshot/are-yo... if I set the threshold to top 10%.