Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum released four years of tax returns on Wednesday. Santorum earned an average of more than $900,000 each year between 2007 and 2010. The hopeful candidate’s adjusted income varied from about $659,000 in 2007, $952,000 in 2008, $1.1 million in 2009, and $923,411 in 2010. Santorum paid an effective tax rate of about 28.5 percent in 2010, according to the IRS 1040 forms released by former senator’s campaign, which is considerably higher than Mitt Romney’s. According to the former Massachusetts governor’s tax returns, released by his campaign in January, in 2010, Romney made $21.7 million and paid a tax rate of 13.9 percent.
Romney’s tax rates were lower because the majority of his earnings came from investments rather than wages. In an ABC News interview on Wednesday night, Santorum said, “He had capital gain income which is taxed at 15 percent. I had ordinary income which got taxed at a higher rate.”
