Ranking Unemployment Insurance Taxes on the 2020 State Business Tax Climate Index

Today’s map is the final in our series examining each of the five major components of the 2020 State Business Tax Climate Index. Compared to individual, corporate, sales, and property taxes, unemployment insurance (UI) taxes are less widely understood, but they have important implications for a state’s business climate. A state’s performance on the UI tax component accounts for 9.5 percent of that state’s overall Index score.

Unemployment insurance is a joint federal-state social insurance program that finances benefits for recently unemployed workers through taxes on employers. State UI taxA tax is a mandatory payment or charge collected by local, state, and national governments from individuals or businesses to cover the costs of general government services, goods, and activities. systems are often quite complex, using variable-rate structures that impose different rates depending on how well-established a business is, its layoff history, and the health of the state’s UI trust fund, among other factors. All 50 states and the District of Columbia levy UI taxes, but some states structure their systems better than others.

The least-damaging UI tax systems are those that adhere closely to the federal taxable wage base, have low minimum and maximum tax rates on each rate schedule, avoid levying surtaxes or creating benefit add-ons, and have straightforward experience formulas and charging methods. More harmful UI tax systems are those that have high minimum and maximum rates, wage bases that far exceed the federal level, complicated experience formulas and charging methods, and surtaxes or benefit add-ons that go beyond the core functions of the UI program.

On this year’s Index, the states with the best-scoring UI tax systems are Oklahoma, Florida, Delaware, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Arizona. The worst-structured UI tax systems are found in Massachusetts, Kentucky, Idaho, Nevada, Alaska, and New Hampshire.

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There are several reasons UI taxes may impact employers’ location decisions. One simple reason is that some states have high statutory minimum and maximum tax rates that apply to large taxable wage bases, while others have low minimum and maximum rates and low taxable wage bases. For example, Arizona, California, Florida, and Tennessee align their taxable wage base with the federal base of $7,000 per employee, while other states extend the taxable wage base far beyond the federal minimum, such that the tax is applied on tens of thousands of dollars of each employee’s wages. (Currently, Washington is the state with the highest taxable wage base, at $49,800.) Rates can only be understood in tandem with wage bases. A 10 percent tax on a $7,000 wage base raises $700, while the same rate on a $49,800 wage base generates $4,980.

Another important consideration is a state’s experience rating formula, which varies from state to state. The concept behind experience ratings is that each employer’s UI tax liability should be adjusted by their own past experience with layoffs. Companies with frequent layoffs face greater liability than companies with steadier track records. But there are different ways that these ratings can be calculated, and different approaches for handling new businesses which have yet to develop a meaningful track record.

Some states lean more heavily on aggregate state “experience,” while others focus more specifically on individual businesses. Some use what is called a benefit ratio formula, based on the ratio of unemployment benefits to payroll. Others use a benefit wage ratio formula, or a reserve ratio formula, defined as the balance in the employer’s state unemployment insurance account divided by payroll.

One of the most harmful aspects of UI taxes is that financially troubled businesses, for which layoffs may be a matter of survival, are shifted into higher tax rate schedules when they can least afford to pay a higher tax bill. Failing businesses face ever-higher UI taxes, sending them into further decline. Similarly, surtaxes imposed when UI fund reserves are low mean higher tax liability right when businesses are struggling most. Well-designed UI tax systems emphasize greater stability and predictability.

To read more about how UI tax systems are evaluated in the Index, click here.

For even more information about UI taxes, read our background paper, “Unemployment Insurance Taxes: Options for Program Design and Insolvent Trust Funds.”

To determine whether your state’s unemployment insurance tax has risen or fallen in the ranks in recent years, see the table below.

Unemployment Insurance Tax Component of the State Business Tax Climate Index (2017–2020)

Note: A rank of 1 is best, 50 is worst. All scores are for fiscal years. DC’s score and rank do not affect other states. Source: Tax Foundation.
State	2017 Rank	2018 Rank	2019 Rank	2020 Rank	Change from 2019 to 2020
Alabama	14	11	12	18	-6
Alaska	29	25	35	46	-11
Arizona	11	15	13	6	7
Arkansas	30	32	34	23	11
California	16	13	17	22	-5
Colorado	42	35	40	43	-3
Connecticut	21	19	23	21	2
Delaware	3	3	3	3	0
Florida	2	2	2	2	0
Georgia	35	38	38	39	-1
Hawaii	24	27	26	28	-2
Idaho	46	46	48	48	0
Illinois	38	42	42	40	2
Indiana	10	10	11	25	-14
Iowa	34	34	33	35	-2
Kansas	12	12	15	14	1
Kentucky	48	47	47	49	-2
Louisiana	9	4	4	4	0
Maine	44	44	24	32	-8
Maryland	26	24	28	33	-5
Massachusetts	49	49	50	50	0
Michigan	47	48	49	17	32
Minnesota	28	37	25	34	-9
Mississippi	5	5	5	5	0
Missouri	7	7	8	9	-1
Montana	19	20	21	20	1
Nebraska	8	9	9	11	-2
Nevada	43	45	45	47	-2
New Hampshire	41	43	44	45	-1
New Jersey	25	36	32	30	2
New Mexico	17	16	10	8	2
New York	32	30	31	38	-7
North Carolina	6	6	7	10	-3
North Dakota	15	14	14	13	1
Ohio	4	8	6	7	-1
Oklahoma	1	1	1	1	0
Oregon	33	31	37	36	1
Pennsylvania	45	50	46	42	4
Rhode Island	50	23	29	31	-2
South Carolina	37	29	27	26	1
South Dakota	40	39	39	44	-5
Tennessee	23	22	22	24	-2
Texas	13	26	18	12	6
Utah	22	21	16	15	1
Vermont	20	18	20	16	4
Virginia	39	41	43	41	2
Washington	18	17	19	19	0
West Virginia	27	28	30	29	1
Wisconsin	36	40	41	37	4
Wyoming	31	33	36	27	9
District of Columbia	27	30	33	35	-2

To learn more about how we determined these rankings, read our full methodology here.

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