Remember the big brouhaha about the non-progressiveness of the US tax rates? Guess what!

Got this from Bizzy Blog:

At the WSJ, Via Alan Reynolds: 'Tax and the Top Percentile Myth'
Filed under: Business Moves,Economy,Taxes & Government — TBlumer @ 9:50 am

Eye-opening:

A 2008 OECD study of leading economies found that "taxation is most
progressively distributed in the United States." More so than Sweden or
France.

A 2008 study of 24 leading economies by the Organization of Economic
Cooperation and Development (OECD) concludes that, "Taxation is most
progressively distributed in the United States, probably reflecting the
greater role played there by refundable tax credits, such as the Earned
Income Tax Credit and the Child Tax Credit. . . . Taxes tend to be least
progressive in the Nordic countries (notably, Sweden), France and
Switzerland."

The OECD study—titled "Growing Unequal?"—also found that the ratio of
taxes paid to income received by the top 10% was by far the highest in
the U.S., at 1.35, compared to 1.1 for France, 1.07 for Germany, 1.01
for Japan and 1.0 for Sweden (i.e., the top decile's share of Swedish
taxes is the same as their share of income).

That's because the those with the highest incomes in the U.S. pay less
of a penalty for creating reporable income and redeploying assets than
those in the other countries named.

That thought leads to Reynolds' wrap:

Once higher tax rates cause the top 1% to report less income, then top
taxpayers would likely pay a much smaller share of taxes, just as they
do in, say, France or Sweden. That would be an ironic consequence of
listening to economists and journalists who form strong opinions about
tax policy on the basis of an essentially irrelevant statistic about
what the top 1%'s share might be if there were not taxes or transfers.

This would inevitably lead to the call for more across-the-board tax
increases on everyone — not exactly what the Left wants … or claims not
to want.

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