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Originally Posted by sck5
a historical note. i may be remembering wrong but I think the first federal income tax was during the civil war. very unpopular and they burned the tax rolls publicly in Washington after the war to prove they would not keep doing it.
Interestingly, that later income tax iin 1913 was quite small and was only on very rich people. it was taken for granted back then that rich people not only could afford it, but that their wealth was at least in part based on the work of others and so it was only fair to do it that way.
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It's still like that, the rich still pay most of the taxes. From wikipedia ..
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Some argue that the current income tax system, which is the government's largest revenue source, is too progressive and redistributive.[29] In 2007, the top 5% of income earners paid over half of the federal income tax revenue.[30] The top 1% of income earners paid 25% of the total income tax revenue.[31] Forty percent of Americans pay no federal income tax,[30] which raises moral concerns regarding wealth redistribution and the economics for controlling the size and spending of government.[29]
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Source:
Income tax in the United States
Worth reading, by the way.