State Tax

West Virginia’s long road to tax relief was beginning to feel older than the trees, but after many years of efforts, the state’s lawmakers are finally taking home a win. Under an agreement reached over the weekend and pending final action in the House, lawmakers and Gov. Jim Justice (R) reached a deal that will

Keen technophiles may recall that the internet is “a series of tubes” (not a “big truck”), and sometimes those tubes get congested. The late Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) fretted about streaming services crowding out other data packets. The analysis is highly technical, but do your best to follow: “Ten movies streaming across that internet and

Tennessee joined the ranks of no-income-tax states in 2022 with the phaseout of the Hall Tax on interest and dividend income. But with other states upping their game to attract ever-more-mobile people and businesses, lawmakers and the governor are not content to leave Tennessee’s business taxes in their current, uncompetitive form. Gov. Bill Lee (R)

Key Findings Forty-five states and the District of Columbia collect statewide sales taxes. Local sales taxes are collected in 38 states. In some cases, they can rival or even exceed state rates. The five states with the highest average combined state and local sales tax rates are Louisiana (9.550 percent), Tennessee (9.548 percent), Arkansas (9.46

Note: The following is Tax Foundation testimony submitted to the Nebraska Revenue Committee ahead of the hearing on LB754 on February 2, 2023. Chair Linehan and Members of the Revenue Committee: As you consider providing tax relief to Nebraska residents, I appreciate the opportunity to share how reducing top marginal individual and corporate income tax

Forty-three states adopted tax relief in 2021 or 2022—often in both years—and of those, 21 cut state income tax rates. It’s been a remarkable trend, driven by robust state revenues and an increasingly competitive tax environment. But many observers doubted the trend could, or should, continue into 2023. It can. It should. It will. Lawmakers

The rate of inflation has slowed markedly in recent months, even declining slightly in December—but at year’s end, prices were still 14.6 percent higher than they were two years prior. That’s the fastest inflation rate over any two calendar years since the stagflation era of the late 1970s. State policymakers are understandably interested in bringing

New York Governor Kathy Hochul (D) has her sights trained on tobacco. Earlier this month, she proposed increasing the New York cigarette tax rate by $1.00 a pack and extending New York’s existing flavored vaping ban to all other flavored tobacco products. If enacted, these policies would fuel black markets and create a fiscal hole for

Key Findings Forty-four states levy a corporate income tax. Rates range from 2.5 percent in North Carolina to 11.5 percent in New Jersey. Four states—Alaska, Illinois, Minnesota, and New Jersey—levy top marginal corporate income tax rates of 9 percent or higher. Eleven states—Arizona, Colorado, Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina,

Heading into the 2011 elections, only two of West Virginia’s 34 state senators were Republicans. Today, only three of them aren’t. The House of Delegates, which was comfortably Democratic until the 2014 elections, now has a Republican supermajority of 88 members to only 12 Democrats. It is the fourth-most-lopsided delegation in the country, after Wyoming

On the heels of adopting one of the most comprehensive state tax reform packages in years, Iowa lawmakers are back in Des Moines with property tax relief in their sights. But while the issue is worthy of their attention, House File 1 (HF 1) as currently drafted misses the mark. Property tax limitations come in

Georgia lawmakers brought a tax reform package across the finish line in 2022 that will change the state’s progressive income tax to a 5.49 percent flat tax beginning in 2024, with triggers to provide additional rate reductions. This is an important step forward, but if the state truly wants to cement its status as a

Wealth taxes are back in a big way. In a coordinated effort, lawmakers in seven states that collectively house about 60 percent of the nation’s wealth—California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, New York, and Washington—are introducing wealth tax legislation on Thursday. The campaign is part of a broader national focus on new taxes on investment, entrepreneurship,

Americans were on the move in 2022 and chose low-tax states over high-tax ones. That’s the finding of recent U.S. Census Bureau population data and commercial datasets released this week by U-Haul and United Van Lines. The U.S. population grew 0.4 percent between July 2021 and July 2022, an increase from the previous year’s historically low rate of 0.1 percent. While

Most state tax changes take effect at the beginning of the calendar year (January 1) or at the beginning of the fiscal year (July 1 for most states). On January 1, 2023, thirty-eight states have noteworthy tax changes taking effect. Most of these changes represent net tax reductions, the result of an unprecedented wave of

Key Findings A typical American household with four phones on a “family share” plan, paying $100 per month for taxable wireless service, would pay nearly $305 per year in taxes, fees, and government surcharges—up slightly from $300 in 2021. Nationally, taxes, fees, and government surcharges make up a record-high 25.4 percent tax on taxable voice

Key Findings Central administration of local taxes is a common feature of sales taxes but is less common for income, tourism, and other local taxes. Absent centralized administration, localities increase their administrative costs, impose substantial additional compliance costs on businesses, and reduce overall levels of compliance. A patchwork approach to local tax administration is particularly

Key Findings: Excessive tax rates on cigarettes induce substantial black and gray market movement of tobacco products into high-tax states from low-tax states or foreign sources. New York has the highest inbound smuggling activity, with an estimated 53.5 percent of cigarettes consumed in the state deriving from smuggled sources in 2020. New York is followed

Consumers experience the pernicious effects of inflation every time they shop. And, in a vicious cycle, a forthcoming change in the federal tax code means that inflation will drive up the cost of the very business investments that can boost supply and start bending the cost curve down. Through inaction, states will follow suit—but they

On Election Day, a narrow majority of voters approved Massachusetts Question 1, also known as the Fair Share Amendment, which will transition the Commonwealth from a flat rate individual income tax to a graduated rate system. Effective January 1, 2023, the Bay State will begin taxing all individual income above $1 million at a 9 percent