Something from the liberal Tax Policy Center

Should the Payroll Tax be included in this? Probably not since liberals would argue that this program is tied to specific benefits and especially since the benefits are strongly tilted towards the poor. But the point is that even including these taxes, the tax rate is quite progressive.

Without the payroll tax, the middle quintile has a tax rate of 4.1 percent and the top 0.1 percent a rate of 29.7 percent. Talk about progressively, that is a difference of 7.24 times. Comparing the fourth quintile to the top 0.1 percent is 8.4 to 29.7, a difference 3.54 times.

The original discussion and figure available here.