"It doesn't look like he has a lot of money tied up in typical assets," said Philip Holthouse, a founder and partner in the Los Angeles accounting firm Holthouse, Carlin & Van Trigt.
Not listed on his return, but disclosed separately, was $58,358 that McCain received in a tax-free Navy pension.
Asked whether his wife was supporting him, McCain's campaign staff offered a separate income calculation for 2007 showing that the senator's surplus income after expenses amounted to about $64,000 and suggested that he was providing for himself.
By contrast, Cindy McCain reported assets of more than $1 million in a single Chase Bank account and assets of up to $1 million in each of about three dozen accounts and investments, according to a 2006 Senate financial disclosure report.
Cindy McCain inherited ownership of Hensley & Co., said to be the nation's third-largest Anheuser-Busch distributor with sales estimated at $178 million, from her late father, James Hensley, according to financial information company Dun & Bradstreet.
Judging only by his returns, McCain would seem to have the lowest income of the three candidates for the presidency. Clinton earned $20.4 million in 2007 and Obama $4.2 million, thanks mostly to books the two candidates wrote. But with his wife's money included, McCain is ranked by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics as the 19th-wealthiest member of Congress.
The 2007 tax return shows that McCain gave $105,467 to charity, most of it to a family foundation that supports surgery for disfigured children and clears mines abroad. The contribution included all of McCain's earnings from his books.
McCain paid about 29% of his total income and 31% of his adjusted gross income in taxes to the federal government, avoiding tax shelters and even avoiding taking deductions for routine expenses for his business as an author of books. He also paid $34,000 in Social Security and Medicare taxes for his staff.
"He is paying his fair share of income tax," Holthouse said.
McCain paid $5,413 in alternative minimum tax, an assessment hitting more and more middle-class Americans and one that the senator wants to eliminate. The return also shows McCain paid $17,700 in alimony to his first wife, Carol, whom he divorced in 1980.
Arizona is a community-property state, meaning the McCains must share any income they earn for tax purposes but can keep separate dividends, interest and profits from assets they brought into the marriage or inherited during the marriage.
