Burgess COMMENTARY

Peter Burgess

The History of US Corporate Taxes In Four Colorful Charts

Are American corporations overtaxed? Let’s find out! First off, here are corporate profits and tax rates since the Reagan era:



Profits have been going up, up, up. Tax rates have been going down, down, down. You can probably guess what this means for owners of capital: they’ve been doing really, really well. Indeed, net dividend payouts to shareholders are up more than 400 percent:



And American tax rates are really low compared to other countries:



Since 1980, obviously, corporations have been doing great. So has this trickled down to the common man? Let’s check out how the middle class is doing:



So there you have it. Over the past four decades, corporate profits have doubled; tax rates have been cut in half; dividend payouts have gone up 400 percent; and the household income of the middle class has … Gone up a whopping 20 percent.

But don’t worry. This time trickle-down economics will work. Believe me.

Kevin Drum KEVIN DRUM

Kevin is a political blogger for Mother Jones. Email Kevin calpundit@cox.net. For more of his stories, click here or follow him on Facebook.

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