Monthly Archive for March, 2007

US Income of Top 0.1 Percent vs Marginal Tax Rate

Published on March 24, 2007 in Area Graph, Income - High, Income - Share of, Pitketty & Saez, Tax Rates and United States. 2 Comments

While the graph in my previous post compared the Top 0.1 percent in different countries, here I made a direct comparison between the US Top Marginal Tax Rate and the Top 0.1 percent income share since 1913. This time just focusing on the United States.

{Click on the graph to take a closer look}
Income of top 0.1% vs top marginal tax magnafing glass

Again the effect by the two World Wars is there but what I wanted to emphasize is the relationship between the share of income going to the very wealthy and the change in the top marginal income tax rate.

The income data can be found on Emmanuel Saez’s web site. I found the marginal tax rate for the United States in the SOI Bulletin Historical Table A at the IRS site via truthandpolitics.org

[tags]income distribution, marginal tax rate, US income distribution, US income inequality, income inequality[/tags]

Popularity: 6% [?]

Comparing Income of Top 0.1 Percent in Five Countries

Published on March 14, 2007 in Area Graph, Canada, France, Income - High, Income - Share of, Japan, Line Graph, Pitketty & Saez, Tax Rates, United Kingdom and United States. Closed

I created these graphs to show the change in the share of income going to the top 0.1%, comparing the United States to Canada, United Kingdom, France, and Japan from 1913-2004.

{Click on the graph to take a closer look}
magnafing glass

The effect by the two World Wars is clear but what is more subtle is the effect on the share of income going to the very wealthy due to the change in the top income tax rate. This could be due to attempts by the very wealthy to hide their income from the IRS or else having a higher tax rate will impact the distribution of income or both. I didn’t have the marginal rates for the other countries but it would be interesting to see if they have a similar relationship between the share of total income captured by the Top 0.1 percent and income tax rates.

The income data can be found here on Emmanuel Saez’s web site. I found the marginal tax rate for the United States in the SOI Bulletin Historical Table A at the IRS site via truthandpolitics.org

[tags]income distribution, marginal tax rate[/tags]

Popularity: 4% [?]