80 • RUBY, WILDING & SWANSBURG In 1998, the average middle quintile household reported $38,967 of income—which placed the m in the 15 percent tax bracket. 34 If you do the math (and, as an actuary, I ha ve), you’ll see that tax bracket rates for the middle quintile were 20 percent higher in 1998 t ha n in 2018. In shor t? Today’s tax br acket rates could ris e signif icantly before approachi ng the rates we were used to payi ng i n the 1990s. As Becky discussed in t he previous chapt er, ball ooning federal debt has put pressure on our government to raise more revenue. My analysis shows increases in tax bracket rat es of 20 t o 30 percent woul d align u s wit h history, not shep herd in a new era of “high” tax es. I n shor t, taxes today are artificially low, thanks in large part to the 2017 tax refor m law. And, they’re very likely to start going up—soon. So what if we retur ned to the 1990s? What would it look like if your taxes rose 30 percent during retirement? Neil’ s goi ng to show you in the next chapter .
34 Tax Foundation. October 2013. “Federal Individual Income Tax Rates History.” h.ptdtpf s://files.taxfoundation.org/legacy/docs/fed_individual_rate_history_nominal
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