Those stats are extremely misleading, because in the US the rich are also disproportional beneficiaries of their tax money (compared to other countries).
In the US the rich pay taxes for schools they end up with better schools in their neighborhood. And they get better parks, and better libraries and better everything in rich neighborhoods. Very little of that money ends up improving poorer neighborhoods, so in the US rich people pay those taxes mostly to themselves. The taxes aren't very re-distributive, which defeats the point of progressive taxation.
Tax deductions in the US also go disproportionately to rich people, whereas in Europe there are many big tax breaks for poor and middle class families.
So it's absolutely not the case that the US has the most progressive tax system among industrialized nations (as claimed in the linked article). Only when you creatively slice and dice the data can you arrive at such a conclusion.
> In the US the rich pay taxes for schools they end up with better schools in their neighborhood. And they get better parks, and better libraries and better everything in rich neighborhoods. Very little of that money ends up improving poorer neighborhoods, so in the US rich people pay those taxes mostly to themselves. The taxes aren't very re-distributive, which defeats the point of progressive taxation.
And Americans wonder why their school system sucks? Why they have more people in prison than China?
This is very true. America leans more heavily on the rich to pay for government than the rest of the OECD. Only Australia even comes close.
http://taxfoundation.org/blog/no-country-leans-upper-income-...