income tax

American  

noun

• income taxes
  plural

1. a tax levied on incomes, especially an annual government tax on personal incomes.

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income tax British  

noun

1. a personal tax, usually progressive, levied on annual income subject to certain deductions

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• income taxes
  plural

Etymology

Origin of income tax

First recorded in 1790–1800

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

income tax

On the other hand, Larson would reduce the income tax on Social Security earnings, returning a bit to middle- and lower-income workers.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 18, 2026

That’s because many lower-income households owe little or no federal income tax, so they can’t profit from the tax breaks.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 14, 2026

Moving from a high-tax state to one with no income tax is like a 30% increase in pay.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 12, 2026

Plus you’ll pay income tax on your pretax distributions.

From MarketWatch ● Aug. 6, 2026

For years after graduate school, she wrote down poet under profession in questionnaires and income tax forms, and later amended it to writer-slash-teacher.

From "How the García Girls Lost Their Accents" by Julia Alvarez