Other Taxpayers Have It Worse

By: Martin Lukac
Submitted: 2007-01-17 16:16:44
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U.S. taxpayers aren't the only ones to feel a bit of a crunch at tax time. In fact, we don't have it that bad.

You may not believe it after paying that huge tax bill in April, but the U.S. isn't the top of the income-tax list when compared to the rest of the world. A recent study by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development compared the tax rates in 30 countries.

In Belgium, a single worker with the average income paid 42% of his income to the government in 2005. Twenty-eight percent went to income taxes and 14% went to Social Security, according to the study.

The German worker also paid a combination of income and Social Security that hit 42%. In Denmark, the average worker only pays 41%.

All tax rates were based on single workers with no children. They did not take into account what the employer pays in Social Security for the worker's behalf.

In the U.S., the average worker pays 24% to income tax and Social Security combined. The rate ranks the country 19th among the 30 listed.

Mexico came in at number 30, with 8% going to the combination of income taxes and Social Security taxes.

"Countries differ in how much they decide to collect in taxes on people's income and how much tax they collect on when good are bought," explained Christopher Heady, head of OECD's tax policy and statistics division.

He points out that Mexico collects a very small amount of tax when compared to the other countries. But it collects most of its revenue on the sales of goods, not on labor. Belgium, on the other hand, doesn't charge much for sales tax, relying on labor income instead.

When all taxes were considered, including income, sales, business and others, Sweden was the top of the list. It tax revenues came in at about 50% of gross domestic product. Denmark and Belgium finished up the top three.

At the bottom of the list were Mexico, at number 30; Japan and Korea, tying for 29 and 28; and the U.S. at 27.

"The U.S. is a comparatively low-tax country. I'm sure the people filing tax returns recently wouldn't agree with that, but that's particularly because the U.S. collects a lot of its revenue from income tax and you don't have a value-added tax," Heady said.

Heady points out that high-tax countries do have benefits.

"Most of those high-tax countries have universal health-care systems. That means you don't have to pay for your own health care or pay for insurance to cover your health," he explained. The countries "usually have more generous state-provided retirement pensions than the U.S, so that people don't usually feel the need to buy a private pension. There's better provision of preschool education, and universities are cheaper. There are all sorts of public services that are provided at lower cost."

However, he points out in the U.S. "the advantage is that you have more choice over how you spend your money, because you get more of it."

Martin Lukac (http://www.MartinLukac.com), represents http://www.RateEmpire.com and http://www.1AmericanFinancial.com, a finance web-company specializing in real estate/mortgage market. We specialize in daily updates, rate predictions, mortgage rates and more. Find low home loan mortgage interest rates from hundreds of mortgage companies!

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