
Map: Income Taxes by US County - pg
http://www.brookings.edu/Research/Interactives/2013/county-income-taxes-map
======
samirahmed
It appears that Teton County Wyoming is the county that pays the most on
average at 67k.

Does anybody have any insight into why that is? For the most part i understand
that high taxes in the more populous and economically prosperous zones but why
a county in Wyoming?

edit: From the nested link

> "In addition, some counties that host popular ski resorts—such as Pitkin
> County, CO (which contains the city of Aspen) and Teton County, WY (which
> contains Jackson Hole)—also have notably high income tax burdens."

[http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/up-
front/posts/2013/12/13-inc...](http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/up-
front/posts/2013/12/13-income-tax-burden-county-by-county-harris)

~~~
npt4279
I had the same question. They have a small population (~20,000), and 65% of
the county's income is derived from capital gains, not wages. I'd guess the
county is an enclave that wealthy people move to after they've made their
money elsewhere. Wyoming has no personal or business income tax.

[http://www.jhnewsandguide.com/news/top_stories/irs-county-
is...](http://www.jhnewsandguide.com/news/top_stories/irs-county-is-
richest/article_9e74fa6f-1b54-5558-8469-72c58a39cf6f.html)

[http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/2004-04-17-wyomin...](http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/2004-04-17-wyoming_x.htm)

~~~
rdl
I wonder what it's like to live in those counties -- do people just stay on
their large standalone properties? Are there local services catering to
billionaires, like in Palo Alto there are stores like Restoration Hardware
catering to mere millionaires? Do the megarich actually spend appreciable
amounts of times there, or is it just a "permanent residence" for people who
are otherwise transient?

~~~
saryant
Jackson definitely has those services. I used to live in Cheyenne but went
over to Jackson once a year or so. My old boss moved up there recently and now
works remotely as a programmer from a cabin he built.

------
apaprocki
"County" is such an arbitrary designation by which to look at data like this,
precisely because of the outliers. If you are going to compare by arbitrary
geofenced areas, why not go more granular and compare by zip code?[1]

Example outlier: Brooklyn (Kings County, NY) is a single county, but if it
were a separate city would be the 3rd largest city in the US. The tax
statistics for this gigantic county (by population, not land size) can vary
each mile you drive down the road.

[1]: IRS 2008 .csv tax data by zip code (large) [http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-
soi/08zpall.csv](http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-soi/08zpall.csv)

[1]: Docs and other formats: [http://www.irs.gov/uac/SOI-Tax-Stats-Individual-
Income-Tax-S...](http://www.irs.gov/uac/SOI-Tax-Stats-Individual-Income-Tax-
Statistics-Free-ZIP-Code-data-\(SOI\))

~~~
dsjoerg
Brooklyn would be 4th largest city in the US, right behind Chicago.

2010 census Chicago: 2.696M

2010 census Brooklyn: 2.505M

Sources:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Brooklyn](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Brooklyn)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_b...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_by_population)

I care enormously about this as I was raised in Chicagoland, now live in
Brooklyn.

Now please, stop misinforming the whole internet.

~~~
apaprocki
The entire hypothetical premise is based upon NYC breaking into 5 cities (one
per borough), therefore making Brooklyn 3rd largest after LA and Chicago.

------
rosser
This is yet another one of those cases where the mean, by itself, is pretty
much meaningless. It would probably be rather enlightening to see the median
by county as well.

~~~
bitbckt
The associated blog post also seems to use median and average
interchangeably(?!):

 _While the median federal income tax burden across counties is about $3,400_

 _the average tax burden across counties is $3,419_

The distribution may be more normal than I assume, or the word "median" in the
first graf may be a mistake.

In either case, I too would love to see the median-based map.

------
FootballMuse
Note: This is federal income tax only. No state, local, sales, or other tax
burdens were included.

~~~
cpwright
This map is of property taxes, I agree it would be interesting to see how
things shake out when you add it all together, including the state/city income
and sales tax burdens.

[http://www.brookings.edu/research/interactives/2013/county-p...](http://www.brookings.edu/research/interactives/2013/county-
property-taxes-map)

------
HistoryInAction
And keep in mind the unique structure of VA counties (especially in NoVA),
where cities are carved out from their surrounding counties, which leads to
deep pockets of blue (voting) and high income tax rates due to concentrated
wealth not being diluted by less affluent areas.

------
crystaln
I'm confused as to why Teton County, WY has one of the highest income tax rate
in the country, given that there is no income tax in Wyoming or Teton County.
The article suggest this is because of the ski resorts, yet I know of no
income tax within Wyoming.

~~~
rdl
Zero state taxes. Full federal taxes (on the capital gains they're most likely
to earn, formerly 15% and now 23.8%; on dividends, much higher)

It's proving a weak relative of the Laffer curve: rich people move to the
lowest practical tax jurisdiction as their taxable income increases.
Particularly wealthy retirees earning passive income.

------
coin
Average taxes paid, per what? Per person, per county? It's probably per filer
but I wish they would explicitly state that.

~~~
kaliblack
> How much does the average tax filer in your county pay in income taxes

^ First sentence of the article

------
oxtopus
Wow. That contrast between New York and Bronx counties is staggering.

