Did president Reagan donate his salary?

Answer 1

It is typical for certain myths to grow up around our past presidents. Usually, these are to serve some image-improving purpose, but are often just fables, such as George Washington admitting to his father as a child that he had cut down a cherry tree, proving he could never lie. This has been proven to never have happened, and was invented by an author a few years after Washington's death to make him appear more perfect, if not saintly.

Similarly, the myth that Reagan donated his salary may have been inspired to improve his image as something better than a rich man cutting taxes for the wealthy. In fact, Reagan never donated his salary as president, or as governor of California. As governor, he was embarrassed one year when he admitted that he had paid no income taxes at all. It was all legal---he had filed the forms but with various deductions and write-offs that were permitted by law he was able to reduce his tax to zero. But it was politically awkward and after that he made sure that he paid at least a little income tax every year.

There have been two presidents who did in fact donate their presidential salaries because both came into office as very wealthy men already. The first was Herbert Hoover (in office 1929-1933) and the second was John F. Kennedy (1961-1963).

In addition, the richest man ever to hold the office of vice-president (or president for that matter) was former New York governor Nelson Rockefeller, appointed by Pres. Ford to serve 1974-1977. The family was the original owner of Standard Oil. Nelson Rockefeller was a "moderate Eastern" Republican, meaning very slightly liberal. Conservatives do not allow this type to be in that party anymore. They pressured President Ford to pick a different much more conservative vice-president when he ran in 1976.

By the way, there has sometimes been controversy about how generous presidents are with their charitable donations. In most years, Mr and Mrs Reagan donated very little or nothing to charity as reported on their income tax forms. In 2011 Mr. and Mrs. Obama donated $172,000 in charity which was 14% of their total income (or 20% of their adjusted income.)