Fall SOI Shows Partnerships Up, Income Down

The total number of partnerships increased 5.2 percent to 2,242,169 for tax year 2002, while partnership net income decreased by 2.1 percent to $270.7 billion, according to the just-released Fall Statistics of Income Bulletin. For the first time, limited liability companies were the most common partnership entity type, totaling 946,130 partnerships, about 42 percent of all partnerships. The Fall 2004 SOI Bulletin also contains articles on individual tax returns for 2002, as well as articles on nonprofit charitable organizations, private foundations and the foreign tax credit. Taxpayers filed 130.1 million individual income tax returns for tax year 2002, a slight decrease from the 130.3 million returns filed for tax year 2001, according to the bulletin. The adjusted gross income reported on these returns totaled just over $6.0 trillion, a 2.2 percent drop from the previous year. This was the second consecutive year that AGI fell. The principal cause of the decline between 2001 and 2002 was a large decline in net capital gain on returns with income above $200,000. AGI on returns with income below $200,000 increased both years.