Is this fair? Top 1% pay more US income tax than bottom 95%

Are rich Americans paying their share of taxes?

Yes, and more, writes Scott A. Hodge of the Tax Foundation here. Citing the most recent Internal Revenue Service data  (through 2007), the richest 1 percent of individual U.S. taxpayers paid 40% of total federal income taxes. The poorest 95% paid 39%. (The 4% next-richest paid the rest.)

But the richest 1% are paying more because they also make a growing portion of U.S. income - over 20%, writes Catherine Rampell on the New York Times website here.

That still seems like the rich pay more than their share. But income tax is only half the story, writes Casey B. Mulligan of the University of Chicago here.

Social Security and Medicare payroll taxes now collect almost as much as the personal income tax, Mulligan writes. They're collected mostly, not from the rich, but only on the first $106,000 of family income. That burden - that tax -falls mostly on poor and middle-class workers, and their employers. (Though you could argue, aren't their employers rich?)