I’m single, and I don’t feel that it’s unfair.
OldGuy’s post is a very good reason for why it’s difficult to come up with a tax system that’s “fair” from every angle.
Fundamentally, the idea of a progressive tax is that people who can afford to pay more, do. There are a lot of ways to figure out “can afford to pay more”, and perhaps some of them are better than others, but $x income for one person is fundamentally different than $x income for two people because it has to support more people.
I’d also pay less tax if I had a kid or other dependent, or if I were blind, and so on. That’s not unfair discrimination. It’s a realization that as a single, sighted, otherwise unencumbered by responsibility for another, person, I have a greater capacity to pay for the expenses of government that we all share.
As others said, it’s sort of unfair, but there’s so many other ways the tax system is unfair that it’s just one item in a long list of problems. I’m in favor of completely overhauling the tax system to make it a whole lot simpler, and honestly, this minor slight against me as single hasn’t even entered my reasoning. Hell, if we had a significantly overhauled and simpler tax system, I’d even be willing to pay a little more just because it would be a lot less of a hassle.
I always thought it was fair because in a situation where one spouse works and the other doesn’t (unemployed, school, illness, etc) if they filed separately, the working spouse is paying standard tax, but is having to support the non-working spouse. A single person is only supporting themselves.
My wife has been a full-time student. Filing jointly and getting a big tax break allows us to afford this arrangement; I consider it part of her ‘stipend/income’.
It isn’t. Some married people pay more, some pay less. My household, for instance, has paid more every year since we tied the knot. The accountant loves to point it out to us.
It’s hard to be outraged over something that does not consistantly discriminate against oneself. “I’m mad as hell! Sometimes I pay more compared to married people, but sometimes I pay less! I will not rest until they always get screwed relative to me!”
After so much political talk about the “marriage tax” and “marriage penalty”, I expect that a great many singles think that any unfairness is in the favor of singles, not married couples. As for the singles who don’t think that, given that the intent to get married at some point is common among singles they may not care since they’ll benefit then.