Quote Originally Posted by Oreo View Post
And this out of the current linked article:

The top marginal tax rate for wages is 35 percent, though that is reserved for taxable income above $379,150.

And this is what my tax chart 2011 is showing also.

No tax changes have been made from the 2009 year to the 2011 year--so what is this chart. It's got to be taxes paid on investment income--(after deductions)
Just an FYI - Marginal rate and Effective rate are two different things.

The marginal rate is the rate at which ordinary income will be taxed for a given income level.

The effective rate is the percentage of tax paid as compared to the Adjusted Gross Income.

The effective rate is generally lower than the marginal rate for a number of reasons. Among these are the fact that income is taxed at progressive levels and also that not all income is treated as "ordinary" income. Also, additional allowable deductions (itemized deductions, for example) will reduce taxable income and certain credits will also reduce the amount of tax thus lowering ones effective rate.

As an example, someone with a $30k AGI and one dependent might have a taxable income (after standard deductions) of $14,000 which would put them in the 15% marginal rate category but with various credits the actual tax they would owe would be <$700> thus resulting in an effective rate of negative 2%.