That's what he has to pay in addition to what was taken out of his paychecks throughout the year. The actual number is probably more like 35%.

Edit: Okay, I don't know if my memory is poor or what, but it looks like taxes for this year are a lot less than I remember. It starts at about 10% for people with little taxable income and goes up to about 38% for the most affluent, with the median probably being somewhere around 20%.

I don't know how other countries deal with it, but in the US, you're taxed on taxable income, which is the amount of money you earn, minus deductions for certain things, like dependents, real estate interest, charitable contributions, medical expenses, etc. Largely, though, you can't use those deductions unless you have a mortgage, as you have to get over a certain monetary amount of deductions before you can really use them, and the interest on a house payment is pretty much the only way for the average citizen to get to that point. Otherwise, you take a ``standard deduction'', which estimates some of that stuff per person in your family.