November 1, 1994 Who Pays Federal Income Taxes? Chris R. Edwards Chris R. Edwards Print this page Subscribe Support our work Download Special Report No. 42 Special Report No. 42 Executive Summary Newly released income tax data shows that the top one percent of income earners now pay more than one quarter of all federal individual income taxes. This striking fact is available in tax return statistics for 1992 from the Internal Revenue Service. These statistics are examined in this report to provide an overview of the distribution of federal income tax payments. Topics Center for Federal Tax Policy Individual Income and Payroll Taxes