Alex Tabarrok kicks off an interesting discussion about federal taxes and progressivity with this post showing who pays how much by income quintile. The interesting stuff is really in the comments rather than the original post -- people dissect the table, add additional information, and argue the economics and the politics. One comment I especially, liked, from someone responding to the fact that the people at the low end of the economic scale account for very little of tax income, was this:

As a mild libertarian I have to ask what is the point of taxing the poor and middle class. Why not just start taxing income over 80 K at a flat 15 percent rate and leave it be. Why do we need to tax people making below 80 K when obviously their tax contributions are meaningless to the federal government?

keph, please read and tell me what you think.