In 2010, according to the TPC, Americans in the lowest quintile of income-earners — the bottom 20 percent — paid minus-3.8 percent of the total federal income tax burden. In other words, they got more back, in income tax credits and the like, than they paid in. Similarly, those in the second quintile paid minus-4.3 percent of the total federal income tax burden — so they, too, weren’t paying into the income tax till but rather were taking out.

Those in the middle quintile — pretty much the center of the middle class (this quintile had an average income of $44,000) — paid 3.9 percent of the total federal income tax burden (about $1 of every $25 dollars in income taxes paid nationwide). And those in the fourth quintile — whose income ranged from $58,000 to $102,000 — paid 15.1 percent of the total federal income tax burden.

So, all told, the 80 percent of Americans whose income placed them in one of these first four quintiles of income-earners combined to pay 10.9 percent of the total federal income tax burden. Put otherwise, this 80 percent of the citizenry paid about $1 out of every $9 that was paid in federal income taxes nationwide.

Meanwhile, Americans in the highest 0.1 percent of all income-earners — these are the very rich, with incomes of at least $1.974 million — paid 16.4 percent of the total federal tax burden. Essentially, one out of every $6 paid in federal income tax was paid by this 0.1 percent of the citizenry.

In other words, the top 0.1 percent paid more toward the workings of government than the bottom 80 percent did. That’s despite the fact that the bottom 80 percent collectively made more than six times as much money as the top 0.1 percent did.