WASHINGTON, July 1, 2015 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Following is the daily "Profile America" feature from the U.S. Census Bureau:
FIRST INCOME TAX
Profile America — Wednesday, July 1st. Income taxes first came to America 153 years ago today, when President Abraham Lincoln signed a bill levying a 3 percent tax on incomes between $600 and $10,000, and 5 percent for greater incomes. After helping finance the federal cause in the Civil War, the tax was rescinded in 1872. The income tax all of us know today dates to 1913, when the 16th Amendment to the Constitution was ratified, giving Congress the power to levy such taxes. About 147 million individual income tax returns are submitted annually, totaling nearly $2 trillion. There are over 27,000 tax preparation offices around the nation. These services employ some 187,000 people engaged in figuring out the personal or business taxes owed. Profile America is in its 19th year as a public service of the U.S. Census Bureau.
Sources:
Civil War income tax: http://www.robinsonlibrary.com/social/publicfinance/revenue/1862.htm
IRS number of individual returns: http://www.irs.gov/file_source/pub/irs-soi/14db02nr.xls
IRS individual tax collections: http://www.irs.gov/file_source/pub/irs-soi/14db06co.xls
Tax preparation services and employment/NAICS 541213: http://censtats.census.gov/cgi-bin/cbpnaic/cbpdetl.pl
Profile America is produced by the Center for New Media and Promotions of the U.S. Census Bureau. These daily features are available as produced segments, ready to air, on the Internet at http://www.census.gov (look for "Multimedia Gallery" by the "Newsroom" button).
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SOURCE U.S. Census Bureau
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