Image by 401K via Flickr
Tax and Fun are two words that almost never go together. Aside from those in the IRS, I bet that most of us would never equate fun with taxes.
For a change, however, we are putting together the lighter side of taxes with simple trivia that you may or may not know. These fun and not so fun facts are bound to let you in on another side of taxes that many of us hardly know.
Fun Facts
1. Did you know that the US tax code contains over 7 million words? That’s more than other famous texts, such as the Gettysburg Address which has only 269 words and the most printed book in all of history, the Holy Bible, which has 773,000 words. Now you know which book to pull out if you want to immerse yourself in some long reading.
2. The 16th Amendment, which established permanent income tax, was ratified in 1913. Out of the fifty states, only four rejected the amendment: Connecticut, Rhode Island, Utah and Florida.
3. In 1990 we had approximately 400 tax forms, but by 2002 the number increased to 526. The tax code itself was also overhauled. It ballooned from only 26,300 pages in 1984 to over 50,000 pages in 2003.
4. That many pages piled together would tower to over 200 inches high- roughly nine inches taller than Shaquille O’Neal!
5. As further proof of how much the IRS loves paper, they send out an estimated 8 billion pages in forms every year.
6. Each year, tax payers give between 20% and 50% of their total salaries to Uncle Sam, not including the additional expense of preparing and filing taxes.
7. We spend approximately 8 billion hours each year managing our taxes, and employ more than a million accountants to work on our tax reports.
8. The IRS employs 106,000 workers. That’s roughly 4,000 more people than the entire of population of Flint, Michigan.
9. The top 1% of the wealthiest people in America have enjoyed lower and lower percentages of their income taxed for the last decade. (How about you, 99%?)
10. New York holds the record for the highest corporate income taxes in the world. They even beat out some strong nations, like China, Japan, and France.
11. If you earn $100,000 in New York, roughly 38% of your income will go to taxes, while only 28% will be deducted from your payroll if you live in Dallas.
12. Although more than 80% of Americans say that cheating on taxes is unacceptable, almost 50% of Americans neglect to pay their taxes. A surprising 90% of those who employ housemaids and sitters are tax cheaters.
With these trivial facts in mind, perhaps you can find some humor when filing your tax return this year.
If tax facts get you all tingly, then you should consider earning an accounting degree online from one of these accounting associate’s degree programs.
