For roughly 76 million American households, the federal income tax could eventually disappear—if a proposal from billionaire Amazon founder Jeff Bezos ever becomes reality.

The Blue Origin owner argued that the bottom half of U.S. earners should pay no income tax at all, saying working Americans should not be placed under increased financial pressure given that they contribute a relatively small share of total tax revenue.

“The bottom half of income earners in this country pay only 3% of the taxes,” Bezos told CNBC. “I think it should be zero.”

To illustrate his case, he pointed to a hypothetical health care worker whose annual tax bill runs to more than $12,000: “Why is a nurse in Queens who makes $75,000 a year paying more than $1,000 a month in taxes?”

“To me, it’s kind of absurd that we’re doing this. We shouldn’t be asking this nurse in Queens to send money to Washington. They should be sending her an apology. It really makes no sense,” Bezos added.

Bezos did not elaborate on his exact calculations. Workers in the U.S. are generally required to pay federal income tax, Social Security, and Medicare—and, in most states, state income tax. Combined, those obligations can stretch into the thousands of dollars per year. Residents of Queens, like everyone living in New York City’s five boroughs, also pay a municipal income tax on top of the state levy—obligations that would sit outside a federal exemption of the kind Bezos is proposing.

Because the U.S. tax system is progressive, higher earners generally pay a larger share of their income in federal taxes. In 2023, the bottom half of taxpayers—those making roughly under $54,000—accounted for roughly 12% of total adjusted gross income but paid just 3% of all federal income taxes, according to IRS data analyzed by the Tax Foundation. The average household in that group paid about $913 a year in federal income tax. However, when refundable tax credits are factored in, the bottom 40% of taxpayers already pay effectively no federal income tax on average, CNBC reported. Those figures cover federal income tax alone: payroll taxes that fund Social Security and Medicare apply from the first dollar of wages, making them a comparatively larger share of the total tax burden for lower earners.

Bezos, who has maintained a warm relationship with President Donald Trump—attending his second inauguration in January 2025, to which Amazon contributed $1 million for the inaugural festivities—said he plans to advocate the idea to political leaders, arguing that exempting lower earners from federal income taxes would represent only “a small amount of money for the government.”

“It is part of our job as citizens and as business leaders to share our ideas,” Bezos said. “And this one would actually help people.”

Turning the idea into policy would require legislation from Congress, and federal tax law has recently tilted toward targeted relief for lower earners: the tax package Trump signed in 2025 created temporary deductions for tipped and overtime income that are scheduled to expire after 2028.

Even doubling his tax bill would not help, Bezos says

Bezos’s concern for affordability may come as a surprise given his estimated net worth of more than $280 billion—among the top five of any person in the world. While he said he personally pays “billions of dollars” in taxes, his tax history has long drawn scrutiny.

A ProPublica investigation released in 2021 found that Bezos—like several of America’s wealthiest billionaires—used tax strategies that dramatically reduced his tax burden in certain years. In 2007 and 2011, for example, he paid no federal income tax at all, in part because investment losses outweighed reported income. Analyzing Bezos’s wealth growth alongside his reported income and taxes paid between 2014 and 2018, ProPublica calculated his so-called true tax rate at 0.98%.

Still, Bezos said he is open to a policy debate about what constitutes a fair tax burden for the wealthy. The top 1% of taxpayers accounted for nearly 21% of total adjusted gross income in 2023 but paid roughly 38% of all federal income taxes that year.

“We can argue about what the fair share is. That’s a policy debate, that’s okay,” Bezos said. “But the vilification is the thing that’s just the distraction.”

Even fixing tax loopholes or increasing taxes on the wealthy, he argued, would not address what he sees as a larger government spending problem. He pointed to inefficiencies in New York City’s public school system as an example.

“If we ran Amazon the way New York City runs their school system, your packages would take six weeks to arrive. We’d have to charge you a $100 delivery fee. And then when the package did finally arrive, it’d have the wrong item in it anyway,” Bezos said.

“You could double the taxes I pay, and it’s not gonna help that teacher in Queens. I promise you,” he added.

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani pushed back on X, writing: “I know a few teachers in Queens who would beg to differ.”

Bezos plans to give away most of his wealth—but MacKenzie Scott has a head start

Bezos has not signed the Giving Pledge—the philanthropic initiative created by Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, and Melinda French Gates that encourages billionaires to give away a majority of their fortunes in their lifetimes or wills—but the Amazon founder said he is committed to giving away most of his wealth during his lifetime.

At the same time, he acknowledged the challenge of doing philanthropy effectively, echoing comments from billionaires including Buffett and Elon Musk, who have said giving away massive sums of money well is often harder than it appears.

Bezos’s ex-wife, MacKenzie Scott, already has a sizable head start. A Giving Pledge signatory since 2019, she has donated more than $26 billion since 2020 to organizations focused on DEI, education, and disaster recovery. Forbes estimates that Bezos and his current wife, Lauren Sánchez Bezos, have donated roughly $4.7 billion over their lifetimes.

Bezos argued to CNBC that the long-term societal impact of companies like Amazon and Blue Origin may ultimately prove even more valuable than philanthropy alone. Creating products and services that improve people’s lives, he said, is the kind of impact aspiring entrepreneurs should prioritize.

“Everybody out there who’s a potential entrepreneur make sure you focus on that,” Bezos said. “You will be creating value for society if you’re successful at pleasing your customers.”

A version of this story was originally published on Fortune.com on May 21, 2026.