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Do Americans pay more in taxes than they spend on food and clothing combined?

Saturday, March 13, 2021
By Gus Fisher
YES

The average American family in the middle income bracket—defined as the middle 20% of families, earning between $36,000 and $69,500 annually—paid $15,748 in federal, state and local taxes in 2018, according to federal data compiled by USAFacts. Meanwhile, the average American household spent almost $9,800 on food and apparel in 2018, as reported in a Bureau of Labor Statistics survey.

In 2014, the U.S. population as a whole paid $4.5 trillion in taxes, which is more than what the country spent on housing, food and clothing combined, the Tax Foundation calculated based on Bureau of Economic Analysis data.

By another calculation using Tax Foundation data, the “median” U.S. wage earner paid about $18,368 in income, Social Security and Medicare taxes in 2019.

This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
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