Tax Burden In Connecticut Among Nation's Worst: Report

CONNECTICUT — New York, New Jersey and Connecticut share more than just borders and a plan to quarantine visitors: they're also among the states with the greatest tax burdens.

According to a new report from the personal finance site WalletHub, New York has the heaviest burden, but Connecticut is not too far behind at No. 6, and New Jersey is seventh.

To determine the states with the biggest tax burdens, WalletHub compared the 50 states across the three tax types of state tax burdens — property taxes, individual income taxes and sales and excise taxes — as a share of total personal income in the state.

Unlike tax rates, which vary widely based on an individual’s circumstances, tax burden measures the proportion of total personal income that residents pay toward state and local taxes. And it isn't uniform across the U.S., either.

According to WalletHub, Connecticut residents pay about 9.99 percent of their total income in state and local taxes, including property and sales taxes.

If it seems high — and it is — it still isn't the highest in New England. The total 2020 tax burden in Maine is 10.57 percent, making it No. 4 on the list, one notch below Vermont at 10.73 percent. The least expensive state is Alaska, where you may have to dig deeply into your wallet to stay warm, but not pay a whole lot for anything else: the tax burden is only 5.16 percent.

As for New York and New Jersey? Residents of the Empire State have the grim distinction of having the highest tax burden, at 12.28 percent. New Jersey fares a little better than Connecticut, with a tax burden of 9.88 percent.

The numbers that jack up Connecticut's tax burden are its property tax burden (4.19 percent) and individual income tax burden (3.09 percent). Ours actually compares very favorably in the category of total sales and excise tax burden. At 2.71 percent, we are No. 40 on the list.