Jeff Bezos Highlights US Inequality, Proposes Tax Exemption for Low-Income Americans

Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, has proposed that half of the United States’ lowest-income households should no longer pay federal income tax. He made the remarks in an interview with CNBC on the Squawk Box programme on Wednesday, 21 May 2026. According to Bezos, the low-income group contributes only a small share of government tax receipts, so tax relief would not significantly burden the state’s fiscal position. ‘I think it should not be 3 percent,’ he said, referring to the share of tax contributed by the lower-income group. ‘I think it should be zero,’ he added.

By contrast, the bottom half of taxpayers contribute around 3 percent. The average income of the bottom group is around $54,000 per year, or about Rp 956.9 million at an exchange rate of Rp 17,721 per US dollar. Meanwhile, the top 1 percent have a minimum income of $676,000 per year, or around Rp 11.98 billion.

‘We should not ask the nurses in Queens to send money to Washington,’ Bezos said, citing a health-care worker earning $75,000 a year, about Rp 1.33 billion. ‘They should apologise to her. That doesn’t make sense,’ he added.

Bezos, who according to Forbes has a net worth of around $269 billion or around Rp 4,766 trillion, said he supports the policy change, though he did not spell out the mechanism in detail.