51% of married couples paid less tax jointly than if they had not been married, according to a 1996 Congressional Budget Office analysis. The average amount these couples saved: $1,300.
42% of married taxpayers paid more by filing jointly than they would have if they'd remained single, the office said. The average penalty: $1,380.
The people who faced the most egregious penalties, as a portion of their income, were the working poor, according to tax expert Edward McCaffery, a law professor at the University of Southern California and the author of "Taxing Women." A husband and wife who each earned $10,000 could end up with a marriage penalty of more than $4,000.
Those low-income couples still face the potential for a tax penalty, said Mark Luscombe, a principal analyst for tax research firm CCH. That's because the earned-income credit, a tax break designed to keep the working poor out of poverty, can be less for a two-earner household than for singles.
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