Income tax in the United States peacetime income tax. The rate was 2% on income over $4000, which meant fewer than 10% of households would pay any. The purpose of the income tax was to make up for revenue that would be lost by tariff reductions. In 1895 the United States Supreme Court, in its ruling in "Pollock v. Farmers' Loan & Trust Co.," held a tax based on receipts from the use of property to be unconstitutional. The Court held that taxes on rents from real estate, on interest income from personal property and other income from personal property (which includes dividend income) were treated
Income tax in the United States on saved income is itself taxed. To the extent that this is considered unjust, it may be remedied in a variety of ways, e.g. excluding investment income from taxable income, making investments deductible and therefore only taxing them when gains are realized, or replacing the income tax by other forms of tax, such as a sales tax. Some economists believe income taxation offers the federal government a technique to diminish the power of the states, because the federal government is then able to distribute funding to states with conditions attached, often giving the states no choice but to submit to