The 1994 data just released by the Internal Revenue Service on the distribution of the tax burden (see figure) make clear again that the vast bulk of the federal income tax burden is borne by the rich.

• The top 1 percent of taxpayers, those with adjusted gross incomes (AGI) above $196,000, paid 29 percent of all income taxes.
• And the top 5 percent of taxpayers, with incomes above $91,000, bore almost half of the federal income tax burden.
• By contrast, the bottom 50 percent of taxpayers, those with incomes below $22,000, paid less than 5 percent of all income taxes.

Who is rich? Many people would consider the top 10 percent or top 25 percent of taxpayers to be rich. The former included all taxpayers with incomes above $69,000, the latter those with incomes above $43,000. Since these income figures are per return, they include two-earner couples.

Thus a single person earning $22,000 would probably be considered poor -- being in the lower 50 percent of taxpayers. But a married couple each making $22,000 would be considered rich, because they would be in the top 25 percent of taxpayers.

The IRS also produced data on effective tax rates -- taxes paid as a share of AGI. They confirm that the federal income tax is steeply progressive.

• The top 1 percent of taxpayers paid 28 percent of their income in taxes on average and the top 5 percent of taxpayers paid 23 percent.

• The top 10 percent of taxpayers paid a little over 20 percent, while the top 25 percent of taxpayers paid 17 percent.

• The bottom 50 percent of taxpayers paid an effective income tax rate of just 4 percent.

Bob Dole's 15 percent tax rate reduction has been assailed as a giveaway to the rich. But it is clear that the so-called rich include a lot of middle-class and working-class couples. And the Tax Foundation says the Dole plan would cut federal income taxes to zero for everyone earning less than $25,000.

Source: Bruce Bartlett (Senior Fellow, National Center for Policy Analysis), "Who Picks Up the Tab...and the Cuts," Washington Times, October 14, 1996.