Actually her tax bill is now up to $21,472. But why is this newsworthy ? You get a monetary prize if you win an Olympic medal: it's $25,000 for gold, $15,000 for silver, and $10,000 for bronze. Missy has won two golds and a bronze (so far), which means that she has made $60,000 (so far). So she owes taxes on that income -- just like any other American who has $60,000 in income. It's true that in many other countries, prize money won overseas would be non-taxable. However, the US doesn't have that particular exemption.
Politifact has double-checked the tax calculations in the original story, and found them highly questionable. The tax calculations assume that a medal-winning athlete is in the highest possible tax bracket (income over $380,000) with no deductions for athletic expenses. Both assumptions seem unrealistic. Summary: So I wouldn't be too worried about Missy's tax obligations.
What a wonder Uncle we all have... One that promotes his family to want to strive for competition, yet when he's glorified by his family's hard work, he'll be more than happy to stab his family in the back for a "little" green here and there. It's a shame that the tax ratio is nearly 36% for a $25,000 earning. Someone who makes $25K doesn't pay close to $9K in taxes. Uncle same sucks... he sucks the money out of your pocket ever chance he can.
Oh, I know she'll land on her feet. I just think it's especially stupid of the government to go out of their way to give someone an honorarium and then take take half of it back. You give someone a birthday present and then discover that half of the cost was put on your own credit card. It's the cheap motherfucking USA that can waste millions of dollars on all sorts of useless porkbarrell projects but then is going to Scrooge-like take a few thousand from a girl who has just spent the last 10 years sweating it out in order to honor her country. I'm betting that if more people knew about this the practice would end immediately.
