former president donald trump and his wife melania paid 0 in income taxes for 2020 according to a report released late tuesday by the congressional joint committee on taxation that year as the covid pandemic hit the trumps reported a loss of 48 million for 2018 and 2019 the thenpresident’s reported income increased and they paid approximately 11 million in federal taxes each year this year some 725 million us households or 40 will pay no federal income tax down from the pandemic high of 100 million households or 60 two years ago according to estimates from the tax policy center in 2021 nearly 56 of households or 99 million paid no federal income tax the nonpartisan think tank said in a report released earlier this year but the reason that the trumps paid nothing in taxes that is their reported loss of almost 5 million is vastly different from the reason that most of that other 60 of americans paid nothing in 2020 people who earn less than the standard deduction which for 2022 is 12950 for individuals and 25900 for married couples filing jointly do not owe federal income taxes although tax experts say it is still a good idea to file a return in order to access tax credits such as the earnedincome tax credit and the child tax credit of course people who don’t pay federal income taxes still pay sales taxes property taxes and other kinds of taxes and many people who work and who don’t owe any federal income taxes still have money taken out of their paychecks for social security and medicare in fact many lowincome and belowaverageincome families pay more in payroll taxes every year than they pay in federal income taxes according to gary burtless a senior fellow at the brookings institution a centrist research group founded in 1916 but for the most part burtless said the us individual income tax is progressive with heavier tax liabilities as you move up the incomedistribution scale and very low or negative incometax liabilities at the bottom of the scale in his own analysis don fullerton a professor of finance at the university of illinois at urbanachampaign found that older individuals are much more likely than younger individuals to pay no tax or to receive tax transfers older people receive the bulk of tax transfers through of social security benefits while younger people are more likely to receive transfers such as unemploymentinsurance benefits “the federal income tax always has excluded a significant fraction of households through a combination of personal exemptions the standard deduction zerobracket amounts and more recently tax credits” the tax policy center report said