State Individual Income Tax Rates and Brackets, 2024
Individual income taxes are a major source of state government revenue, accounting for more than a third of state tax collections. How do income taxes compare in your state?
8 min read
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State and Local Sales Tax Rates, 2024
Retail sales taxes are an essential part of most states’ revenue toolkits, responsible for 32 percent of state tax collections and 13 percent of local tax collections (24 percent of combined collections).
9 min read
State Corporate Income Tax Rates and Brackets, 2024
Graduated corporate rates are inequitable—that is, the size of a corporation bears no necessary relation to the income levels of the owners.
7 min readAll Related Articles
Does Your State Have a Sales Tax Holiday?
Although state budgets may be in unusual places this year, sales tax holidays remain the same as they always have been—ineffective and inefficient.
3 min read
State and Local Sales Tax Rates, Midyear 2021
The highest average combined state and local sales tax rates are in Louisiana (9.55 percent), Tennessee (9.547 percent), Arkansas (9.48 percent), Washington (9.29 percent), and Alabama (9.22 percent).
12 min read
How High Are Property Taxes in Your State?
Because property taxes are tied to housing values, it makes sense that the actual dollar amounts of property taxes tend to be higher in places with higher housing prices. This map takes housing value into account to give a broader perspective for property tax comparison.
3 min read
Beer Taxes by State, 2021
2021 state beer excise tax rates vary widely: as low as $0.02 per gallon in Wyoming and as high as $1.29 per gallon in Tennessee. Missouri and Wisconsin tie for second lowest at $0.06 per gallon, and Alaska is second highest with its $1.07 per gallon tax.
3 min read
How High Are Wine Taxes in Your State?
States tend to tax wine at a higher rate than beer but at a lower rate than distilled spirits due to wine’s mid-range alcohol content. You’ll find the highest wine excise taxes in Kentucky at $3.23 per gallon, far above Alaska’s second-place $2.50 per gallon. Those states are followed by Florida ($2.25), Iowa ($1.75), and Alabama and New Mexico (tied at $1.70).
2 min read
Distilled Spirits Taxes by State, 2021
Of all alcoholic beverages subject to taxation, stiff drinks—and all distilled spirits—face the stiffest tax rates. Like many excise taxes, the treatment of distilled spirits varies widely across the states.
3 min read
What Are the Chances Your State Withholds Much of Your Lottery Winnings?
Krispy Kreme may have started the vaccine incentive ball rolling, but many states are putting big money into the effort with vaccine lotteries. Unlike a normal lottery, no one is paying for tickets—but the tax collector still gets paid when someone wins.
2 min read
How Well-Funded Are Pension Plans in Your State?
Although most states are on solid financial footing following the coronavirus crisis, pension liabilities are a deep-seated problem that long predates the pandemic.
2 min read
How Does Your State Treat Social Security Income?
Thirteen states tax Social Security benefits, a matter of significant interest to retirees. Each of these states has its own approach to determining what share of benefits is subject to tax, though these provisions can be grouped together into a few broad categories.
4 min read
How Much Does Your State Collect in Property Taxes Per Capita?
Property taxes are an important source of revenue for local and state governments. In FY 2018, property taxes generated over 30 percent of total U.S. state and local tax collections and over 70 percent of local tax collections.
2 min read
How Much Does Your State Collect in Sales Taxes Per Capita?
Rightsizing a state’s sales tax base can not only make the tax more equitable and better align it with the modern economy but also generate revenue that can be used to pay down the rates of more harmful taxes. That is why sales tax base broadening, which is favored by public finance scholars across the political spectrum, features in many tax reform plans.
3 min read
What Location Matters Can Tell Us About State Tax Competitiveness
Location Matters is an account of tax complexity and the ways that tax structure affect competitiveness. For policymakers, it represents an opportunity to explore the seemingly more arcane tax provisions that can have a significant impact on business tax burdens, and to discover how their tax code—often completely by accident—picks winners and losers.
4 min read
U.S. Top Combined Integrated Tax Rate on Corporate Income Would Become Highest in the OECD
Under President Biden’s tax plan, the United States would tax corporate income at the highest top rate in the industrialized world, averaging 65.1 percent.
3 min read
State and Local Individual Income Tax Collections Per Capita
The individual income tax is one of the most significant sources of revenue for state and local governments, generating approximately 24 percent of state and local tax collections in FY 2018.
2 min read
How Are Your State’s Roads Funded?
Traditionally, revenue dedicated to infrastructure spending has been raised through taxes on motor fuel, license fees, and tolls, but revenue from motor fuel has proven less effective over the last few decades.
4 min read
How High Are State and Local Tax Collections in Your State?
Although Tax Day has been pushed back this year, mid-April is still a good occasion to take a look at tax collections in the United States. Because differing state populations can make overall comparisons difficult, today’s state tax map shows state and local tax collections per capita in each of the 50 states and the District of Columbia.
2 min read
Vaping Taxes by State, 2021
Several states are considering introducing or increasing taxes on vapor products to make up declining tax revenue from traditional tobacco products or to fill budget holes in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. However, lawmakers should approach the issue carefully because flawed excise tax design on vapor products could drive consumers back to more harmful combustible products like cigarettes.
3 min read
How High Are Taxes on Recreational Marijuana in Your State?
The legalization and taxation of recreational marijuana remains one of the hottest trends in state taxation.
6 min read
Does Your State Levy a Capital Stock Tax?
Capital stock taxes are imposed on a business’s net worth (or accumulated wealth). As such, the tax tends to penalize investment and requires businesses to pay regardless of whether they make a profit in a given year, or ever.
4 min read
Does Your State Tax Business Inventory?
Inventory taxes are levied regardless of whether a business makes a profit, adding to the burden of businesses already struggling to stay afloat.
2 min read