Alabama

Policymakers in Maine and Oregon wisely said “no” last week to an income tax break for deep-pocketed tech investors and venture capitalists that was expanded in last year’s federal tax bill.

State legislative sessions are wrapping up, and final tax and budget packages are making their way to governors’ desks.

ITEP tracks tax discussions in legislatures across the country and uses our unique data capacity to analyze the revenue, distributional, and racial and ethnic impacts of many of these proposals. State Tax Watch offers the latest news and movement from each state.

In Washington, Gov. Bob Ferguson and lawmakers decided to stop fooling around with one of the nation’s most upside-down tax codes and finally brought to life a new millionaires’ tax, the first new income tax created in a state since 1991.

The recent spike in gasoline prices is on pace to cost American drivers an extra $9.4 billion per month. Gas prices are up dramatically across the country, but the South has been hit hardest and is on pace to pay $4.2 billion more per month.

As many state legislative sessions near or cross the halfway point, lawmakers are facing tough choices.

National Sausage Month isn’t until October, but now is the time of year when state lawmakers are really diving into their sausage-making processes, as separate legislative houses and oftentimes political parties send competing bills, budgets, and visions back and forth to grind out their differences.

State lawmakers are grappling with a range of challenges as their fiscal outlooks deteriorate, federal tax enforcement wanes (after the Trump administration cut the IRS workforce by 25 percent), and a rewritten federal tax code sends states scrambling to decide what changes they might want to make in their own codes.

State governors are beginning to lay out their top priorities as legislatures reconvene in statehouses around the country.

property tax debates are taking place throughout the nation.

State deductions for tips and overtime are not only ineffective at supporting working-class people, it will come at a substantial cost to state budgets.

Lawmakers in two more states have wisely said “no thank you” to federal tax cuts that would have flowed through to their state tax codes and undermined funding for their priorities

A costly tax break for wealthy venture capitalists is drawing some critical attention from state policymakers.

States should decouple from the federal Qualified Small Business Stock (QSBS) exemption.

Despite an increasingly bleak state revenue outlook, state lawmakers across the country continue to prioritize regressive tax cuts.

The Trump megabill hands the richest 1% a trillion-dollar windfall while gutting funding for health care, education, and disaster relief — leaving communities to pick up the pieces. State and local leaders must step up, tax the wealthiest fairly, and safeguard the essentials that keep America healthy, educated, and safe.

All eyes in statehouses in recent weeks have been on federal budget negotiations, and now that the “megabill” has passed, they are focused in on their own budgets in search of ways to cope with the enormous consequences coming their way. All states will see fewer federal dollars flowing through their coffers, higher needs due […]

The megabill will raise taxes on the poorest 40 percent of Americans, barely cut them for the middle 20 percent, and cut them tremendously for the wealthiest Americans next year.

Sales tax holidays are often marketed as relief for everyday families, but they do little to address the deeper inequities of regressive sales taxes. In 2025, 18 states offer these holidays at a collective cost of $1.3 billion.

If instead of giving $117 billion to the richest 1 percent, that money had been evenly divided among all Americans, we'd each get $343 - or nearly $1,400 for a family of four.

The last states are wrapping up legislative sessions, and some are crossing the finish line with major income tax cuts.

President Trump has signed into law the tax and spending “megabill” that largely favors the richest taxpayers and provides working-class Americans with relatively small tax cuts that will in many cases be more than offset by Trump's tariffs.

As federal aid ends and economic uncertainty grows, local governments face tough budget choices. Now is the time for localities to protect vulnerable residents and build stronger, more equitable fiscal foundations.

The predominant feature of the tax and spending bill working its way through Congress is a massive tax cut for the richest 1 percent — a $114 billion benefit to the wealthiest people in the country in 2026 alone.

The Senate tax bill under debate right now would bring very large tax cuts to very high-income people. In total, the richest 1 percent would receive $114 billion in tax cuts next year alone. That would amount to nearly $61,000 for each of these affluent households.