$52,300 for a family of 4 is what the government needs to collect.

[Rath]

Firstly is that the median income before tax?

Secondly the reason congress would do this is because an extraordianry situation requires an extraordinary budget.

Edit: And also progressive taxation along with higher earnings amongst the rich means that using the median rather than the mean income is really quite misleading, the income scale is nothing like a bell curve.