I think you're underestimating. There are Federal AND state taxes and that math quickly adds up.

Not all states have income taxes.

State income taxes are usually pretty low.

Texas and Florida don't have an income tax.

Georgia ranges from 1% to 5.5%.

California goes all the way up to 13%.

The very wealthy can usually avoid paying anywhere near these amounts, though. Corporate owners can pay themselves a nominal salary and let the corporation grow. Capital gains are only due when stock is sold. So they avoid selling and borrow using their stock as collateral.

At least that’s lower than in many European countries. In case of the income tax at least.

(Helped by Google …)

In NYC, earning about $100k a year, the effective rate is ~28% tax (ie, you pay $28k tax a year), including federal (~15%) and state (~5%), social security etc.

In the UK, for £100k, it looks like it’s 27.4%.

So very similar levels.

$100k is £71k, you’d pay £21k in taxes on that which is 30%

Well our UK tax bands are marginal tax rates.

So you pay zero on the first £12,570 of earnings. Basic rate of 20% from £12,571 to £50,270 of earnings. And then 40% on £50,271 onwards.

(We have additional rate over £150,000 of 45%).

It's important to remember you don't pay a flat %age on your income. It's worked out as a precentage of income you earn inside the thresholds

That’s all irrelevant. I was quoting actual tax paid, not marginal rates.

You also forget a major part of tax levied on workers but not on owners - national insurance.

Don’t forget that you start to lose the personal allowance over £100k so there’s a point at which the marginal tax rate is around 60%.

Yup. That level is at 50k if you have two kids. Even higher with three kids.

> In NYC, earning about $100k a year, the effective rate is ~28% tax

That doesn't include VAT (or whatever it's called in America), tariffs, excise duties though, does it? It'd be curious to see a comparison between countries that would cover all those things (like how much you earn, and how much you actually pay for some average set of goods).