The best states to be middle class

Has the middle class been forgotten? Not when it comes to taxes. 

The middle class typically give a large portion of their paychecks to the government, along with low-income residents, but these tax burdens vary state by state. WalletHub recently ranked all 50 states and Washington, D.C., to determine where people in different income brackets hand over the most and least on sales and excise taxes, property taxes, and income taxes, measuring the share of a resident’s income that is contributed to taxes.

Read more: The 20 best states to be poor

“There has been significant opposition to state and local income taxes. This has especially been the case lately, in part due to states and localities amassing significant savings from better-than-expected recovery from the pandemic and federal pandemic aid,” Iuliia Shybalkina, assistant professor at the Martin School of Public Policy and Administration at the University of Kentucky, said in a statement. “Unfortunately, such reforms are likely to result in public service cuts that tend to affect low-income families more than high-income ones. To avoid cuts, places would need to increase other taxes, such as sales taxes that are considered less fair.”

Middle-income earners in the top state of this ranking have a 4.98% total tax rate as a percentage of income. 

Scroll through to learn more about the states with the lowest tax burden on middle class residents.

Source: WalletHub