Who pays the least amount in taxes?

Answer 1

The September 2008 issue of the JOurnal for Financial Planning has in the "Stat Bank:"

The number of taxpayers with AGI Of $200,000 or more who paid no income tax in 2005 was 7,389.

Note, however, that this is using AGI, or Adjusted Gross Income, not Gross Income. So the 7,389 is a reliable number, but we don't know how much these people earned before using the AGI credits. There is no question that people with low incomes pay the least taxes, by far. In fact, unlike what is suspect the above is trying to imply (the # of people with AGI over 200K is likely in the millions), the facts are and have been for some time (approx), 95% of the personal income tax collected is paid by 3% of the people. More amazing and to your question, 50% pay no tax and 40% of them actually get money back in the form of EITC and other credits. The link below leads to an excellent, unbiased, well respected organization that has tons and tons of statistics and anlysis of government income and spending.