"While continuing to point out that the US has a lower tax burden than Denmark, Sweden, Belgium, ... Canada"
As far as Canada is concerned, this statement is false in certain cases. For example, the small business (income < 0.5 mln) corporation tax rate here in BC is 13.5%. This is combined state + federal, and will go down to 12.5% in 2011. The corresponding rate for the US is 40%, I believe.
Income taxes rates are also lower for certain income brackets. When they lowered taxes here a few years ago, the claim was that people making $90K/year face the lowest tax rates in North America. Here is a somewhat informative table of taxes paid for various income brackets: http://www.wolrigemahon.com/txrates.html.
Where the US makes up for lost ground though is through the myriad tax deductions that are sprinkled to various special interest groups, e.g. mortgage interest deductions, etc.
It's not false in the aggregate; an equally fair argument would be to find locales in the US with miniscule property taxes and no state personal or corporate income tax (somewhere in Wyoming, presumably).
As far as Canada is concerned, this statement is false in certain cases. For example, the small business (income < 0.5 mln) corporation tax rate here in BC is 13.5%. This is combined state + federal, and will go down to 12.5% in 2011. The corresponding rate for the US is 40%, I believe.
Income taxes rates are also lower for certain income brackets. When they lowered taxes here a few years ago, the claim was that people making $90K/year face the lowest tax rates in North America. Here is a somewhat informative table of taxes paid for various income brackets: http://www.wolrigemahon.com/txrates.html.
Where the US makes up for lost ground though is through the myriad tax deductions that are sprinkled to various special interest groups, e.g. mortgage interest deductions, etc.