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The Kerrys' taxes
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry likes to complain about "tax cuts for the rich," but he and his heiress wife, Teresa Heinz Kerry, paid only 15.2 percent of their gross income in federal taxes last year, NewsMax.com reports.
The figure is around half the amount of income tax paid by President Bush and his wife, first lady Laura Bush, as a proportion of their household income, NewsMax said.
The Bushes paid $227,000 in federal taxes on a gross 2003 income of $822,126. Their Internal Revenue Service bill amounted to 28 percent of their household income.
But Mrs. Kerry, who, as one of the richest women in the United States files separately from her husband, paid just half that amount as a percentage of her income, forking over to the IRS $587,000 on a $5 million-plus 2003 gross income.
An estimated tax payment on a filing due in October brought her total 2003 IRS bill up to $750,000, her campaign said Tuesday. But even with additional payment, Mrs. Kerry's federal tax tab amounted to just 14.6 percent of her gross income.
Added to her husband's $90,575 IRS payment on a gross 2003 income of $395,338, the Kerrys' total federal tax bill came to $840,500 — or just 15.2 percent of their $5,510,000 household income.
"The would-be first lady's tax bill was so low because she sheltered more than half her income — $2,777,000 — in tax-exempt bonds," NewsMax said.

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