The Obamas' annual tax return has revealed that President Obama and wife Michelle received a household income of $2,656,902 (approx. £1,778,427) in 2008.
This snapshot into the President’s gross earnings, released by the White House, also revealed that the couple paid $933,208 in taxes and gave $172,050 to charity during the course of the year.
The vast majority of President Obama’s household income (a reported $2,479,648) can be attributed to the royalties he received from sales of his two best-selling books - his autobiography ‘Dreams From My Father: a story of Race and Inheritance’ and his political manifesto ‘The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream’. The sales of both books, first published in 1995 (although re-released in its current form in 2004) and 2006 respectively, have unsurprisingly received a surge in popularity since Obama started on the campaign trail to become the 44th President of the United States.
Filed jointly, the federal tax return showed that the Obamas together donated a total of almost 6.5% of their household income to charity during the course of the year, with Care and the United Negro College Fund both receiving the largest donations of $25,000 a piece. They also paid $855,323 in federal taxes and $77,883 in state taxes.
This year the President is set to receive a statutory salary of $400,000 as remuneration for his position and has reportedly already signed a $250,000 book deal that will see him adapt his memoirs for a younger audience.
