2026 tax year · cross-border wages
Crossing a state line into or out of Massachusetts
Massachusetts taxes its residents on income earned anywhere, and taxes non-residents on work done inside it. Which return you file depends on which direction you commute.
Massachusetts borders 5 states. They fall into 2 different situations, and which one applies decides whether you file one return or two.
Where you file a nonresident return and claim a credit
Massachusetts has no agreement with Connecticut, New York, Rhode Island and Vermont. Work in one of these and you file a nonresident return there, report the same income again to Massachusetts, and claim a credit for what you already paid. The credit is capped at your Massachusetts liability, so you are not taxed twice, the combined bill lands at roughly the higher of the two rates. On $70,000, New York costs the most at $3,665 and Connecticut the least at $3,500, $165 between them.
| Work state | Its tax | Massachusetts after credit | Total | Rate that governs |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Connecticut | $3,100 | $400 | $3,500 | Massachusetts |
| New York | $3,665 | $0 | $3,665 | New York |
| Rhode Island | $2,625 | $875 | $3,500 | Massachusetts |
| Vermont | $3,145 | $356 | $3,500 | Massachusetts |
Where the work state takes nothing
New Hampshire levies no personal income tax, so there is no return to file there and no credit to claim. But Massachusetts still taxes the wages as a resident. The catch is withholding: an employer in New Hampshire has no state income tax to withhold, so nothing is taken out for Massachusetts either. The liability is real and nothing is being set aside against it, which usually means Massachusetts estimated payments.
What Massachusetts itself takes across a salary range
A single filer, taking the standard deduction. This is the figure every arrangement above is measured against, the tax Massachusetts charges a resident, whether the work happened inside the state or over a line:
| Wages | Massachusetts tax | Effective rate |
|---|---|---|
| $45,000 | $2,250 | 5.00% |
| $70,000 | $3,500 | 5.00% |
| $120,000 | $6,000 | 5.00% |
Coming the other way: living in a no-income-tax state, working in Massachusetts
New Hampshire border Massachusetts and levy no personal income tax of their own. A resident of New Hampshire who works in Massachusetts has the simplest arrangement on this page and the least room to improve it: Massachusetts taxes the wages earned inside it, $3,500 on $70,000, there is no home-state return, and so there is nothing to claim a credit against. Living across a border that charges nothing does not reduce the Massachusetts bill by a cent.
Reciprocity cannot help either, even where Massachusetts has agreements: reciprocity shifts the income to the home state's return, and a state with no income tax has no return to shift it to.
What Massachusetts charges as your home state
Massachusetts applies a single 5% rate to taxable income for 2026, so every extra dollar of wages is taxed at the same state rate.
State income tax on wages only, 2026 rates. Not tax advice, what this does and doesn't cover.