After-tax money income estimates of households: 1984
Nelson, C.T.
Current Population Reports. Series P-20 Population Characteristics 1986(147): i
1986
ISSN/ISBN: 0363-6836 PMID: 12280649 Document Number: 348091
This report provides an improved measure of year to year changes in household purchasing power and of differences in purchasing power between subgroups of the US population. 4 types of taxes are simulated and subsequently deducted from the total money income received by households in order to estimate after tax income: 1) federal individual income taxes; 2) state individual income taxes; 3) FICA and Federal retirement payroll taxes; and 4) property taxes on owner occupied housing. Results show that: 1) mean household income after taxes was $21,560 in 1984, up by 2.7% over the 1983 figure after accounting for the 4.3% rise in consumer prices; 2) this mean household income before taxes ($27,460) increased between 1983 and 1984 by 2.9%; 3) taxes absorbed about 22% of the total money income received by households; 4) households paid an average of $6400 in taxes in 1984, about $20 higher than paid in 1983; 5) the mean after tax income of households increased in 1984 in the Northeast, South, and West regions; 6) in 1984, 64% of households with incomes below the poverty level paid 1 or more of the types of taxes covered in this study; and 7) the percentage of income paid in taxes ranged from 10% in households with incomes less than $10,000 to 28% in households with incomes of $50,000 or more. The payment of the 4 types of taxes simulated in this study reduced the income available to households by about $513 billion in 1984. The combination of Internal Revenue Service (IRS) tax return statistics with the March Current Population Survey (CPS) income data may affect these estimates to a small degree because the IRS returns include these units which are not contained in the CPS universe: 1) prior year delinquent returns; 2) returns of Armed Forces members living overseas or on base without families; and 3) returns of decedents.