>>>#define usually. Most of the shareholders pay tax. Most of tax payers are not necessarily shareholders.
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>>About 60% of American households have position in stock market, i.e. they are shareholders. About the same percentage of American households pay taxes. I venture to say that these percentages are superimposed. Your idea that most taxpayers are not shareholders is clearly wrong.
>
>There's a subtle difference between "are not" and "are not necessarily". Minor details aside, it would be interesting to know some numbers, i.e. how much of this mess, in percentages or billions, was caused by bad decisions of these shareholders who are the majority of taxpayers.
>
>update: BTW, does Joe Q start to count as a shareholder just because he's got a bit of a retirement somewhere in a fund and the fund starts playing the odds?

Sure he does. He's actively financing the fund.