April 15th is still a few days away, but that’s not what the exciting news is today. April 10th, today, is the first day in which the taxpayers of North Carolina finally get to start working for themselves instead of paying taxes. That’s right, it took this long before you earned enough money to pay your taxes – crazy to think about. Brace yourself, as a nation we still have eight more days before our tax bill is paid. What I am talking about is Tax Freedom Day, the date on which Americans will have earned enough money to pay this year’s tax obligations at the federal, state and local levels. The Tax Foundation has calculated two separate Tax Freedom Days, one for the states and one for the country as a whole.
North Carolina’s Tax Freedom Day arrived on April 10th this year ranking it 21st earliest in the nation. Neighboring states are ranked:
- Tennessee, April 2nd (3rd earliest)
- South Carolina, April 3rd (4th earliest)
- Georgia, April 9th (18th earliest)
- Virginia, April 20th, (10th latest)
Worth noting is that Mississippi is ranked first and Louisiana second in the nation both having a Tax Freedom Date of March 29th. This means that as the legislature begins discussions of a revised tax plan for North Carolina, they need to keep in mind our direct competitors in the south have lower taxes and earlier freedom dates than we do.
