The Right Way to Analyze Tax Data - Income Retained % vs. Income Given (Taxes + Charity) %

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[zencycler]

I think our side needs something like this:




I made this graph using data from www.taxhistory.org

The comparison I'm providing to Romney's 2011 figure is based on the charity he actual donated, which was more than he choose to deduct.

Of particular note is the blue line showing the low percentages Obama historically gave to charity until he started running for high office!

[9YearLurker]

Nice thought, but I don’t equate charity and taxes, and don’t like to go judging what’s charitable and what’s not—despite tax-free nonprofit status.

[zencycler]

The data points on the graph for Obama come from here:

[Noob1999]

I’m sorry, I have troublr understanding your chart.

Starting with Adjusted gross income, then reducing that by charity giving and taxes should leave you with “spendable income”

Your charts take AGI and add tax and charity to arrive at to $ total kept.

????????????

I have no idea what you are trying to accomplish.

If you have $100 in your pocket, give $20 to the church, then pay $10 in taxes, your $ total kept is $70, not $130 per your calculation.

[zencycler]

You're right, the data I showed was adding those when it should had subtracted. The percentages are right since I calculated the percentage kept as 100 % - the total percentage paid out (taxes plus charity). But that $Dollar amount of the total kept was wrong, as you stated, because it was added instead of subtracted.

The percentages, which were correct, is what was used in the graph. But to clear up the confusion, here is the correct data, taken from the 2000 to 2011 returns, which now shows the correct percentages AND totals, to correspond with the graph.

Thanks:

[zencycler]

So now, with the graph and the corrected data, what I'm trying to accomplish is to show:

1) The percentage of Romney's welath that he keeps for himself (after paying out taxes and charity) truly is a "fair share", based on both common sense, and relative to what others pay and would expect a wealthy person to be able to retain.

2) The history of Obama's charitable giving pales in comparison to Romney, and Obama's history also shows him pumping up his charitable donations as he began to run for higher office.

3) Because of his low charitable giving, Obama has been retaining a greater percentage of his wealth for himself than Romney.

[zencycler]

Total $Kep = Total $Kept (the “t” seems to have been squeezed out in the graphic).

[cajungirl]

charity is not the same as taxes,,hell, you could give your charity to your family foundation that employs your worthless son in law. Or to a mythical charity you form called Abortions for All!

Mitt’s charity is nice but not taxes.