Gallup: Fewer people think their taxes are fair

The number of the people in the U.S. who believe their income taxes are fair is the lowest in a dozen years, according to a Gallup poll released Monday.

The poll, released on Tax Day in the U.S., found that 55 percent of people in the U.S. believe their taxes are fair, down 4 percentage points from last year and 9 points from the a recent high in 2003.

{mosads}Gallup chalked up the decline mostly to Republicans, who are now about evenly split on how fair or unfair their taxes are. About two-thirds of Democrats think their taxes are fair, with the split between the two parties growing since George W. Bush left the White House.

The latest findings from Gallup also come after Washington allowed tax rates for family income above $450,000 a year to rise.

“Taxes have been at the forefront of much of the debate over economic and budgetary policy in recent years, although, in reality, federal income taxes have not changed for most Americans since Obama took office, because the president has preserved the Bush-era income tax cuts for all but the highest-income Americans,” wrote Gallup’s Jeffrey Jones.

Gallup found little difference between how households making above and below the $75,000 a year felt about their taxes – 57 percent of workers making under $75,000 thought their taxes were fair, compared to 54 percent of those above that mark.

In fact, the polling company said there were “no notable differences by most major demographic groups,” with the split on party and ideological lines being the largest.

Gallup also noted that the recent high-water mark in 2003 — when 64 percent of people thought their income taxes were fair — occurred shortly after then-President George W. Bush signed his second round of tax cuts and not long after the start of the Iraq war.