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<Click on chart for larger image>
<Click on chart for larger image>
For the sake of comparison, L’Anglophone, a newspaper in Brussels, released the following data from a 2010 study examining the Tax Freedom Days in various countries across the EU. Citizens of Cyprus only work 72 days each year to pay off their tax burden while citizens in Hungary must work 218 days each year to pay their share of taxes. On average, the government in Cyprus takes 19.4% of all income while Hungary’s government takes almost 60% of all wages!
Today is officially the day when citizens of the United States have earned enough money to pay this year’s tax burden. Any money earned for the rest of the year will theoretically go into the pockets of the wage earners as opposed to the government.
As the charts below show, since 1900 Tax Freedom Day has come as late as May 1 (in 2000) and as early as January 19 (in 1913). Translated another way, citizens of the U.S. had to work as many as 123 days in 2000 and as few as 19 days in 1913 to cover their share of the tax burden.