Taxation and the middle class

[plam]

I might be wrong, but there are a ton of tax loopholes rich people use so no matter how much tax they owe, they'll find a way to get around it and not pay. We obviously need to fix the system but that seems unrealistic atm

There really aren't a ton of them. It's possible to lower the amount of taxes paid in many ways and possible to avoid some entirely, but it's not an easy thing to do. It's also precarious legally, so most people out there are not going to opt to do something that could result in having money taken away or face prosecution for. People in general just do not really like having to have their money be taxed. Every person out there looks at their finances, gets to the Tax and Deductions sections and sighs.

I, for one, am happy to pay the 27% tax rate that my federal tax return says. There's that Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr quote “I like to pay taxes. With them, I buy civilization.”

It is also the case that the US IRS has been underfunded and are not as effective in going after higher-income people as they would like to be. It's a lot harder for people with regular T4 (W2) salary income to hide it from the government than people with more complicated investments.

https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/irs-announc...ce-efforts