Quarter of Millionaires Pay Less than Middle Class.

Uh oh, looks like a few millionaires aren't paying their fair share:

FT: A quarter of US millionaires pay lower taxes than some middle-class households, congressional researchers said, in a report that is bound to fuel the political battle over the taxation of the wealthiest Americans. The Congressional Research Service found that some 94,500 American taxpayers are in a similar position to that presented by Warren Buffett, the billionaire investor, when he claimed in August to be paying a lower tax rate than many of his Berkshire Hathaway employees.

The average tax rate for households earning more than $1m was 30.5 per cent, above the 24.6 per cent rate paid on average by families earning less than $250,000 per year. However, a chunk of millionaire taxpayers paid rates close to 24 per cent, according to the report, a level that at times was lower than the taxes paid by middle-income families that did not benefit from many deductions. The CRS report concluded that the current tax system violated the Buffett rule and suggested, for instance, that raising taxes on capital gains and dividends, not allowing “carried interest” to be taxed as ordinary income, or allowing Bush-era tax rates for the wealthy would make it compliant with that principle.

Oddly, one Republican congressman only asked Warren Buffett to disclose his tax forms, instead of asking other wealthy individuals to show theirs. Buffett smarter than that:

Buffett has continued to spar with Republican lawmaker Tim Huelskamp and other conservatives who have been urging him to disclose his tax returns in an effort to be more transparent about his claims. Mr Buffett said this week that he would be willing to publish his tax forms if other wealthy Americans, and Rupert Murdoch of News Corp in particular, would do the same. “I hope you succeed in getting the ultra-rich … to share in the sacrifice many millions of other Americans will be asked to do,” Mr. Buffett told Mr Huelskamp.