Please check my assumptions.
Fox is reporting that Obama paid a lower tax rate than his secretary, Anita Breckenridge.
http://www.foxnews.com/...
How is this possible? Obama had a 20.5% effective tax rate. I just filled out a 1040EZ, pretending to be Anita Breckenridge. From that link, I put down $95,000 in adjusted gross income. Let's make the worst case assumptions that Anita Breckenridge is single and has no deductions. Ergo, she takes $9,500 for the $5,800 standard deduction and the $3,700 exemption. Her taxable income is $85,500. Her tax from the table is $17,564. $17,564/$95,000 = 18.39%, which is obviously less than 20.5%. ??!!
If Anita Breckenridge is married and her husband has a large income and thus a large effective tax rate, that's very nice for her, but that doesn't mean that she has a larger effective tax rate than the President.
Update 1: Edited title, which initially said "lower". Oops!
1:41 PM PT: Update 2: Married filing separately is actually marginally more worst-case than single: $17,982. But $17,982/$95,000 = 18.93%, still obviously less than 20.5%.
2:28 PM PT: Update 3: Clarified separation of $9,500 into $5,800 standard deduction and $3,700 exemption. Thanks, thatgeekinit!
Disclaimer: I am not a tax accountant!