Pennsylvanians Agree the Tax System Is Unfair. They Just Disagree on Why

In the next installment of four pieces exploring attitudes among Pennsylvanians surrounding inequality and taxation, RealClear Opinion Research’s joint polling effort with Emerson College returns to a high level, exploring attitudes across a variety of demographics. Once again, we’re drawing on a survey of 2,000 Pennsylvania residents.

Sixty-nine percent of Pennsylvanians think the U.S. tax system is unfair, though they disagree as to just how unfair it is. Over a third (36%) say it is “somewhat” unfair, while 33% describe it as “totally” unfair. The same survey finds 63% saying the ultrawealthy pay too little in federal taxes, while majorities say average workers (59%), the middle class (54%), and small businesses (51%) pay too much. That’s a pretty mundane finding, but what’s really interesting is that this description breaks down in strikingly clean ways, depending on three separate things: how well-off you are, which party you belong to, and where in the state you live.

Let’s look at money first. Unlike what we found with the “wealth cap” concept, the perception of fairness falls almost in a straight line as self-described economic standing drops: 53% of Pennsylvanians who call themselves “wealthy” say the system is fair, then 41% of the upper-middle class does so, 36% of the middle class does so, 27% of the working class does so, and 18% of those who describe themselves as low income do so.

The partisan differences are even sharper. Only 23% of Democrats call the system fair, with independents giving the same response (23%). Republicans are almost twice as likely to call it fair (42.5%). Even then, 57.5% of Republicans call the system unfair. Nevertheless, this is a real partisan gap, and a wider gap than the parties’ own self-described finances would predict, since Pennsylvania Republicans and Democrats describe their economic standing in fairly similar terms overall.

Geography, on the other hand, doesn’t map neatly onto either of the other factors. Ranked by how unfair residents find the system: Southwest, 76%; Northwest, 74%; Northeast, 71%; Southeast, 69%; South Central, 61%; and North Central, an outlier at 55% – more than 20 points below the angriest region in the state. North Central is also one of the smaller regional samples here, so that number should probably be taken “seriously” rather than “literally.” But a 20-point gap between two ends of the same state, on the same question, in the same poll, is hard to explain away as noise alone.

Taken together, the three don’t add up to one uniform picture of Pennsylvania. The view that the tax system is unfair dominates every party group and every region, as well as every economic group (save for the small share of respondents who describe themselves as wealthy). Its strength varies depending on where you look, and no single divide captures the whole pattern.