Taxation and the middle class

[plam]

• Median taxpayer (all taxpayers): $35,100 income, 7.7% average tax rate
  
• Median taxpayer (in top half): $79,500 income, 11.7% average tax rate
  
  
• Top 50% of taxpayers: $79,500 average income, 20.0% average tax rate
  
• Top 10% of taxpayers: $165,300 average income, 27.2% average tax rate
  
• Top 1% of taxpayers: $477,700 average income, 36.7% average tax rate
  
• Top 0.1% of taxpayers: $1,624,600 average income, 40.5% average tax rate
  

Non-progressive taxes (such as HST) adjust the picture somewhat but the reality is that in Canada the total taxation still remains progressive.

And, personally, I don't think our income tax rates are too high ...

Strongly agreed. I would say my average tax rate but that would disclose my income with this chart here. I will say that I think that my average tax rate is more than reasonable and it's certainly higher than the 20% and less than the 40% numbers.

People also always misunderstand marginal tax rates. It's like we don't teach people in school what a marginal tax rate means.