Average marginal tax rates in the U.S., 1913–2019

Measuring marginal tax rates at the economy-wide level, while useful for empirical work in economics and beyond, is a non-trivial exercise. This paper revises and updates through 2019 the average marginal income and Social Security tax rates originally conceived by Barro and Sahasakul (1983, 1986) and Seater (1982, 1985) and subsequently updated by Stephenson (1998). The update extends previous estimates of the marginal tax rate series over two decades—thus providing more than a century of data going back to 1913. This update also revises the estimates reported in previous studies to provide historically consistent series following more recent comprehensive revisions of the National Income and Product Accounts. The newly updated series reflect tax legislation over the last two decades. Generally, tax cuts in the early 2000s along with the Great Recession led to a decrease in overall average marginal tax rates from levels achieved in the late 1990s. The Trump tax overhaul in 2017 lowered average marginal tax rates by about one percentage point.