Edward J. McCaffery is Robert C. Packard trustee chair in law and a professor of law, economics and political science at the University of Southern California. He is the author of "Fair Not Flat: How to Make the Tax System Better and Simpler" and founder of the People's Tax Page. The opinions expressed in this commentary are his own. View more opinion at CNN.

(CNN) The New York Times published on Tuesday a spectacular bit of reporting, stretching out to nearly 15,000 words, on how Fred Trump, the President's late father, used aggressive tax avoidance schemes to get vast sums of wealth to his children, especially Donald.

The Times piece is the kind of massive story that few of us have time to read (the Times itself has even published some CliffsNotes versions of it.

Edward J. McCaffery

In the rush to summarize and understand, the main takeaway in the media seems to be that the Times story is confirmation that Donald J. Trump is not, indeed, a self-made man, contrary to the story the President likes to tell. But that will not surprise too many; there has long been reporting about the family bases of the President's wealth. What should count as a main theme is not that Trump is not a self-made man, but rather that he is a man made, in considerable part, on taxpayers' money. That is, all of us, not just Fred and Mary Trump, have played a role in both the myths and realities of Donald J. Trump, possible billionaire.

The very late British philosopher Thomas Hobbes was born when the Spanish Armada was en route to, presumably, conquer England (that didn't end well for the Spanish), and he famously wrote that his mother gave birth to twins: himself and fear. Donald Trump's twin was tax avoidance.

In 1946, the year of Trump's birth, the top marginal tax rate under the income tax was 91%, on income above $200,000 . Fred Trump did not want to pay that rate, or any rate, it would seem. What did he do? Like many aggressive taxpayers at the time, Fred put the young Donald on his payroll, and gave him property so that he, Fred, would have to pay his son rent. Per the Times: "[b]y age 3, Mr. Trump was earning $200,000 in today's dollars from his father's empire. He was a millionaire by age 8." Later we learn that Fred "made Donald not just his salaried employee but also his property manager, landlord, banker and consultant."

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