Under the agreement, the taxpayer only incurs tax liability where she is domiciled (Virginia), and can disregard the District’s income tax code entirely. Consider, for instance, a resident of Virginia, which participates in a reciprocity agreement with the District of Columbia, where the taxpayer’s office is located. ![]() Occasionally, neighboring states have reciprocity agreements which dramatically simplify obligations for taxpayers. To understand the issue, it is first necessary to consider what typically happens when someone lives in one state and works in another. Rules like the one temporarily adopted in Massachusetts have significant implications for telecommuters going forward. It can result not only in having tax liability in two states, but in true double taxation: paying taxes to two states on the same income, without any offsets. This unusual situation, where an employee could owe income taxes to their employer’s state even if they never personally set foot in it during the pandemic, is a pandemic-era innovation for Massachusetts, but was already the rule in six states. Massachusetts is demanding income tax payments from some of those who both live and work in neighboring New Hampshire (and elsewhere) during the pandemic, drawing objections and threats of litigation from Granite State officials. Convenience and Similar Sourcing Rules in Action As the changing world of business transforms these rules from a nuisance to a source of significant interstate conflict, moreover, Congress may wish to step in, exercising its Commerce Clause powers to better define how far states can reach in taxing interstate economic activity. They could, however, have an adverse effect on long-term competitiveness, as telework-friendly businesses increasingly choose to locate their offices elsewhere to avoid subjecting their employees to double taxation. If so, these rules, which treat an employee as if they worked out of their company’s office even if they never actually did so, could become increasingly popular as a short-term revenue option for states facing an exodus of increasingly teleworking employees. Constitution.Ĭompanies’ unplanned experiment in telework may yield a long-term shift in how we conceptualize the workplace. This is inequitable, inconsistent with widely accepted principles of sound taxation, and potentially incompatible with the Dormant Commerce Clause of the U.S. So-called “convenience rules” and similar income sourcing rules not only obligate workers to pay tax to jurisdictions where they did not work, but in many cases, they also strip them of eligibility for tax credits designed to avoid double taxation when someone lives in one state and works in another. But absent a federal response, many taxpayers could be in for a rude awakening when their income taxes come due. Federal lawmakers are also considering offering some relief from the practice, either permanently or as a pandemic-specific measure. States can tax your income where you live and where you work-but a growing number of states may also seek to tax your income even if you neither live nor work there, an aggressive posture that becomes increasingly consequential as more Americans work remotely both during and potentially after the COVID-19 pandemic.
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