Comment on Top 400 taxpayers paid 18 percent in 2010

WASHINGTON — The top 400 taxpayers in the United States paid an average tax rate of 18 percent in 2010, the lowest since 2007, according to Internal Revenue Service data released Friday. The wealthiest taxpayers earn most of their money from capital gains, which are taxed at preferential rates, letting them pay effective rates far below the 35 percent marginal income tax rate that year. People who earn all of their income from wages often pay a higher tax rate than the very wealthiest Americans, said Leonard Burman, director of the Tax Policy Center in Washington. The comparable rate for all taxpayers in 2010 was 11.8 percent, and that includes more than 40 percent of households that paid no income taxes that year. The data show the highest-income U.S.