Legal history of income tax in the United States adopted an income tax modeled on the tax instituted in England. The British theory was that you tax the income from property, and not the property itself; thus, sales of property were not subject to taxation. In order to help pay for its war effort in the American Civil War, the United States government imposed its first personal income tax, on August 5, 1861, as part of the Revenue Act of 1861. Tax rates were 3% on income exceeding $600 and less than $10,000, and 5% on income exceeding $10,000. This tax was repealed and replaced by another income tax
Income tax in the United States income tax in the above example would be $3,980.00. In addition to income tax, a wage earner would also have to pay Federal Insurance Contributions Act tax (FICA) (and an equal amount of FICA tax must be paid by the employer): Total federal tax including employer's contribution: Effective tax rates are typically lower than marginal rates due to various deductions, with some people actually having a negative liability. The individual income tax rates in the following chart include capital gains taxes, which have different marginal rates than regular income. Only the first $118,500 of someone's income is subject to social