Submitted by SameProfession254 t3_11ltfna in Maine
I work with a bunch of guys from New Hampshire and they are always just ragging on Maine for the taxes. Seems like the only joke they have. I've lived here my whole life so I guess I'm just used to paying them. So are they as bad as people make it out to be?
I moved from MA-> ME, taxes are higher, but not so much so that it deterred my move.
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Mainers get so much more back from taxes than NH residents do. Just look at cooky ‘free stater’ BS and lack funding for schools. Tell me making $38k as a teacher in NH is better. Even in rural districts in Maine pays new teachers more!
Sure you pay some income tax, but property taxes in NH are so insanely high (where they cash out) that living in western ME and grocery shopping in NH you probably make out way better lol
Mostly depends on your political affiliation.
I moved here from Massachusetts for school and then ended up meeting and marrying my wife and staying here. Taxes are taxes. No complaints from me. Hell, I'd probably raise them for some.
Edit: given my income bracket and stance on taxes, I'd be increasing my own taxes.
NH: The “Live Cheap or Die” state.
As an adult I’ve lived in FL, TX, MD, TN, GA, & now ME. I’m convinced that total taxes you pay are about the same if you’re a homeowner. A renter might see a difference in taxes paid, but not necessarily in expenses incurred.
My last location before ME was GA. In GA, no excise tax on vehicles & slightly different state income tax structure, but sales tax is 2.5% higher on all purchases. Also millage rate on property taxes is higher.
So the state’s still going to get their money.
FL, TN, & TX had no state income tax, but property & sales taxes made up for it.
MD had taxes on everything & everything was more expensive, so total out of pocket total was higher, but salaries were higher also.
Red state/Blue state/Purple state didn’t seem to matter to me. They’re all going to figure out how to get your money for their projects & blame the shortfall on someone else.
That’s just my experience anyway.
Buy your beer in NH, return your bottles in Maine, hell that's profit!
I dont know about you but i sure like having garbage trucks instead of the hellscape NH has. Ill pay my slightly higher taxes happily.
I lived in NH most of my life sans the last 8 or so years. No. We just pay taxes differently. There's two big lies you're brainwashed into believing in NH
And its just not true. Real estate taxes are staggering. My brother and mother both live in smaller houses than me , in worse towns and pay taxes orders of magnitude higher than me.
The other big one is that infrastructure is embarrassingly underfunded. Even if the maine taxes are net more expensive we get waayyyy more and our state is far superior.
Yeah, it's pretty bad.... do any retirement planning or investigation into best places to retire from a financial perspective. Look at this link... Maine is squarely in the worst tax category of all 50 states. "States that offer minimal to no retirement income tax benefits. These states also do not have particularly friendly sales, property, estate and inheritance tax rates."
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NH still gets you with car registrations. They don't call it an excise tax. I paid like $350 in local fees on a 10 year old Corolla before moving to Maine.
Tough talk from guys that are not living free but refuse to die. Cowards.
100% that it mostly evens out because if something isn’t taxed, or is taxed lower, they make up the revenue somewhere else. That said, property taxes are local and can vary wildly depending upon where you live, esp in ME. If you live in a ME city or a town with public water/sewer, the property taxes are much higher than in a rural town on a home of equal value. And of course, property taxes are based on the value of a home, which a lot of people don’t get as they just look at the dollar amount of what they pay. My property taxes in MA are 5x higher than my property taxes in ME (no public water/sewer), but my house in MA is worth 3x more and the MA taxes pay for public water, sewer, trash removal/recycling (not covered in my ME property taxes), excellent town amenities and I’m in a top MA public school system, so I’m getting a lot of value for that tax money.
New Hampshire funds everything from property taxes and my understanding is they are crazy high.
I generally agree with this statement. I have lived in MD, VA, WA, and ME. At the end of the day it mostly evens out. I have came to the conclusion that any place the majority of people see as a desirable place to live will cost you in taxes, cost of living, or salary (up or down).
When you include insurance premiums and out of pocket costs for healthcare, hell the USA has some of the highest taxes in the world.
The joke is definitely on people who think this is a joke. Because the wages in Boston are 50% higher, and the income tax is 5%.
By all means, don't take the Boston jobs though. Leave them for the rest of us :)
You can make numbers say anything you want, but this is an interesting analysis that found that NH was #1 on the return on investment from taxes:
I live in NH and I just got my yearly invoice for my 11 year old Camry. It's $117.
Tons of misinformation in this thread.
ME rural areas pay new teachers more because the state mandated it.
Experienced teachers still get paid shit.
43rd is “some of the highest”?
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/highest-taxed-countries
I think the difference is in most of Maine the income is lower than other states. So your tax per income is higher than most states.
I don’t have garbage trucks in my town. You pay per bag at the transfer station.
It’s moreso cost of living overall. We have lower salaries and higher cost of living. It’s just never been a state where employers pay much. The sprawl doesn’t help, we have a very low population density so it costs more per person to maintain roads and the like.
There’s teachers in RSU40 that make over 100k a year.
And it prolly took them 30 years to get there. Which is another joke.
Can't pay income tax if you don't have any income points at temple.meme
The joke is that if you live in New Hampshire and commute to Boston your overall tax burden and cost of living ends up higher than it would have been if you just stayed in "Taxachusetts".
> When you include insurance premiums and out of pocket costs for healthcare
This is probably the important qualifier in their post.
Yes we pay higher taxes than most places.
Depends on where you live. My property tax is less than $5,000. With no sales tax and no income tax this works for me.
No
When talking about taxes, it's important to look at all taxes and look at income levels too. My go to for information is Who Pays from ITEP.
So if you look at Maine, for example, you can see in the lowest 20% of income you'd pay 8.7% of family income. In, for example, NH at the lowest 20% you'll pay 9.1%.
On the other hand, if you are in the highest 20% in Maine you'll pay 8.6%. in NH it's 3%
Just for fun if you're in the lowest 20% in Florida you'll pay 12.7% (ouch). If you're in the top it's 2.3%.
Safety & quality of life costs money. Maine is one of the safest states in the country and our states Medicaid is partly responsible. Mainecare is one of the most comprehensive medicaids in the country. Safety nets provide safety to society not simply the recipients. I recently sold land in Colebrook NH - 2 years ago i visited there for final time - the min wage was 7.50 an hour (has since risen) sidewalks & roads unplowed in winter 1/2 hour from Canada.They now have a stand your ground gun law. NH is considered the Arkansas of the north. Check out the crime rates of southern lower tax rate states vs Maine. Its not rocket science. And Maine gives plenty of tax breaks to huge corps - that should be addressed 1st to lower the overall tax burden instead of reducing services.
Or you could say the US has some of the lowest taxes in the developed world, and when you add in expenses for healthcare it’s right on par with the other developed countries.
>https://smartasset.com/retirement/retirement-taxes
I spent some time once trying to find state SPENDING numbers, and although it ends up getting skewed because of states that in general are net contributors vs net beneficiaries of Federal dollars + military spending + deficit spending, over time, net revenue from taxes and spending will need to balance out. I basically took this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._state_budgets#cite_note-26 and tried to reason about it.
My guess is that state differ in how they treat local taxes & services vs state provided ones, as well as some states that have large 'external' income streams such as oil/timber/resources/tourism/federal spend, like Alaska & Hawaii, but have relative low populations end up spending more pr. capita.
The ~$1500/pr capita spend for Maine vs New Hampshire could all be state tax revenues from lobster rolls at Red's + federally subsidized BIW salaries, for example.
I moved NY to ME - my income taxes went down but property taxes went up. It all seems to even out.
I know youre prolly joking but just in case you arent, as a small biz owner, folks need to know you cant return NH cans in Maine for a deposit anyway - there are fines associated actually for doing so.
1000 k fine or 1 year in jail STILL for weed in NH - i think they have 2 medical weed dispensaries in the entire state
Pay no mind to what the fuck-muppets of the Granite State have to say about anything.
Sure. That might be fair. I don't have the numbers either way, but I thought it unfair to judge a guy on half his comment.
Illegal
And I thought it was unfair to add more money to the pile, then incorrectly say the US has “some of the highest” when really that just brought the US in-line with many other developed countries.
Maybe with coaching, and clubs, and a shit ton of extra duties, but no teacher is making even close to a base 100k salary in RSU-40.
But check out New Hampshires property taxes...
Health insurance premiums in the USA are the highest in the world, the average for a single person being $500 a month and for a family $1300 a month. This doesn't include max out of pocket deductibles an other co-pays etc. That's brutal. Sure this is not a tax, but it is a de-facto required expense, as if you go without this, you are putting your life and livelihood at risk along with your family's. So it is not brining it "in-line" with other countries it is going above and beyond. Not to mention things like property tax and other forms of taxation in these states with no income tax or sales tax gets hidden from international comparisons. Honestly talk to anyone who moved to the USA from places like Canada, Australia, many places in Europe. They often think they will be free from high taxes, only to discover it gets transplanted to other places, and they are paying for it elsewhere.
I'm very well aware that it's illegal and there are steep per-container fines for individuals lol.
> talk to anyone who moved to the USA from places like Canada, Australia, many places in Europe. They often think they will be free from high taxes, only to discover it gets transplanted to other places, and they are paying for it elsewhere.
So, that’s exactly what I said. The US has relatively low taxes until you add in healthcare, then it goes up to be about in-line with other developed countries.
You agreed with me.
Yes, a joke made by people who don't understand that you'll be living in a house that's 2 or 3 times the size of the one you left in MA.
No one making that move cares that they will pay an extra $5k in property taxes per year.
The "joke" sounds like copium from people who don't understand.
Awesome! …And all you need to do to get that return on investment is live in the backwards ass, Mississippi of New England.
Bro you are taking this very personally. Almost sounds like you spend a lot of time sitting in traffic on I-93 rationalizing your life choices.
I work from home, and I live in my dream house. I've worked in both NH and MA, so I have like 15 years of experience with this exact situation.
You can assume whatever you wish!
Except I didn't say "in line", I said above and beyond. Also even without healthcare, many states with sales and income tax are more than many countries. It's the states with no sales tax or income tax that bring the average down in the USA, as this does not consider property tax, fees for services, and other forms of taxation not normally calculated in international stats. One of the issues with a such a huge country with many levels of govt, it's hard to see the price you pay on the ground as a regular person.
stealing this one, cheers
> Except I didn't say "in line", I said above and beyond.
I’d like to see the math that says when you add all of it up, the US is paying more.
I keep seeing that many other countries have universal healthcare and the US has to pay so “the US pays more for healthcare” but that ignores that they also pay 45-50% tax and VAT.
So if you’re going to claim the US is more expensive, compare apples:apples and show the math.
Most countries with universal healthcare are not paying 45-50%, that is really only a few countries that also have huge safety nets and public services well beyond healthcare (not to mention the Americans spend more on healthcare costs than other country on earth). If you want to show the math state by state and country by country, you better sit down and pay some tuition. When you are paying 6-15 GRAND in healthcare premiums each year, you better believe no one in other countries have this burden. No one moves to the USA to escape taxes or reduce their tax burden, it just doesn't happen. Personally speaking, I have lived in about a half dozen other countries (although I am one person, and this is purely anecdotal), the USA is one of the highest burdens with regards to taxes and income reduction I have encountered. This nonsensical American exceptionalism, where we can't compare it to any other country, because "apples and oranges" is a defeatist attitude, and a flight from the reality on the ground.
> Most countries with universal healthcare are not paying 45-50%, that is really only a few countries
Finland
Japan
Austria
Denmark
Sweden
Belgium
Israel
Netherlands
Portugal
Ireland
Spain
Germany
UK
France
Australia
Greece (44%)
Italy (43%)…
I posted the link. I’m not sure what more I can do.
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/highest-taxed-countries
You keep typing words back at me. Why won’t you back up your claim? Post info on how the US spends more when you take into account all taxes.
Adding to Florida, a friend with a ~$280k home is paying $4000 for homeowners insurance alone. Flood is additional.
I think a similar home in Maine is $900-1200/year.
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Laughs in NJ.
Taxes are one of those things that really depends on your ROI. Also people will complain no matter what. $.01 to some some is egregious. But then turn around and expect top services from their government. The issue ME is having is a diminishing tax base. But coming from NJ, ME’s taxes are a shoulder shrug.
> I’m getting a lot of value for that tax money.
Yeah, this is something that people should be paying more attention to. It's not just about how much you're paying but whether the value you get out is worth what you're putting in.
Americans like to pretend we're all rugged individualists, but very few of us are actually living that kind of life. Not even the "Live Free or Die" guys mocking OP.
I agree people always make a deal about the state tax but that state will get its money somehow. Certain houses in certain counties in New Hampshire was ridiculous when I was looking to buy there .
A 350 k house with 12 k yearly tax bill which would mean you could pay the house off and still owe 1000 bucks a month .
But hey no sales tax …
Maine has one of the highest tax burdens in the country. NH is towards the bottom in total tax burden.
This seems pretty on point. I have a friend who is in finance and did the math when they were moving from West Hartford CT to a cheap part of New Hampshire. There was only an $8,000 a year difference. They still wanted to live on west Hartford but their spouse wanted to live on NH. If they had moved to a more expensive part of NH, it probably would have been about the same. They had a lot less services where they moved in NH and NH likes to fee you to death.
Edit: it's like florida. We pay more to live in florida than we did to live in Fairfield county part of CT. Florida will fee you to death, property taxes go up every year because they add assessments last minute, then you have all the different insurances needed to have a house. It's crazy how much insurance and the types of insurances required.
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They are high for the standard of living here.
Our home in Florida has regular homeowners insurance, hurricane insurance, flood insurance, sink hole insurance (which I admittedly didn't renew this year), and a million dollar termite bond for formosan termites only. That's the most common type of termite in our area. If we were in northeastern, central or southern florida we would have to have other types of termite bonding. There are 3-4 types of termites in those areas that are prevalent.
Our regular homeowners with hurricane was $1400 when we first moved and now it's ~$3,000, I think closer to $3400 but I would have to double check. That doesn't include the flood, sink hole, or termite. We aren't in a flood zone but it has gone from $400 a year to $575 since it's based on housing value. Our termite is just under $400 a year, which we get a couple discounts on to get it to that number. Sinkhole used to be $400 per year and now is $500 but I didn't renew that this year due to sink holes not being prevalent in our area.
Our house is also now over 6 years old. I'm fully expecting a letter about them not covering our roof fully if there is damage going forward. Many companies have gone to a percentage of the roof based on age. We have a florida only insurance. USAA was 3x more expensive when we initially looked into insurances. Most of the nationwide insurances are much more expensive as well.
I can't wait to get out of this state. It's so expensive, there are no good services in our area, our tax dollars don't go far here due to extreme corruption, they cater to tourists mostly, and it's hot as hell.
Edit: our home is a 4/2/2, 2098 sqft that we bought for $252,700 in 2016. Our same house layout on a 1/10 of an acre, sold for $500k recently. It's absurd.
Lots of people in this sub aren't familiar with life here 20 minutes inland.
I’ve never been an angry shake-my-fist kind of idiot when it came to taxes. I live in a society and societies aren’t free. We all want to go tax-free and lean into subsistence’s homesteading? Great — until we’re invaded and are subject to authoritarian rule and now we have no dollars. Lol. Not a single American doesn’t benefit from tax-funded infrastructure, education and defense.
I just wish we’d better address the wasteful spending and maximize the punch my tax dollars make. There’s plenty of arguments that are legitimate when it comes to the bullshit that our money goes to.
Nah it's not bad. I started here, I've lived all over and came back. Unless they're just talking sales tax that they don't pay down there
Absolutely. I get a lot of value for my tax dollars. I like safe infrastructure. I like having well maintained parks, traffic lights, good schools, safe cars, safe school busses, public transportation options, libraries and well paid government employees who serve the community. Those things aren’t free, but it’s the price I pay for the standard of living that I want. And that standard of living, when supported by tax dollars, is maintained community-wide, which reduces such problems as poverty, which in turn reduces crime. It’s a pretty good deal.
People who grumble about high property taxes in good school systems also don’t seem to appreciate how much funding that school system increases their property values. Maybe they don’t have school age kids, so they think they’re not receiving any benefit, but if you dug up their house and planted it two towns over where they would pay lower taxes, their house is now worth $100k, $200k, maybe $1m less, just to save like $1k a year.
And don’t even get me started on the Live Free or Die/rugged individualist people who imagine themselves as some kind of cowboy living in the wild Wild West as they drive on roads funded by taxpayer dollars, eat meat inspected by safety inspectors, live and work in buildings and drive cars that comply with safety codes - every single thing they can do safely throughout their day is thanks to some kind of government regulation. Most of those people have never traveled to other countries that lack our kind of standards, maybe they’d appreciate what they have.
That said, I don’t think they are the majority or even close. I think most people like a government that guarantees a certain standard of living, infrastructure and safety for its citizens. The “Live Free” people who want to dismantle it are outliers and the government officials who actually vote to dismantle it do so only because they are bought and paid for by big business.
They are one of the northeastern states that are friendly to military retirement though. They don't tax military retirements at all.
NH property taxes are 3x Maine’s. Not sure where he gets his info
Maine has more freedoms then the Live Free or Die state. Remind them of that one.
MA gave back way more. Much better incentives. But it was a higher cost of living.
Live free or die, though. Lol
Hidden or open, they all tax you at the rate necessary to provide services. Your NH buddies just don’t notice that they keep the same percentage of wages by year end.
Maine taxes are high once you go over XX in income.
Exactly. His co workers must not own property. NH makes up for no income/sales tax by having high property taxes. It all washes out in the end no matter where you live.
NH taxes are low but they make up for it in property taxes. Pretty much evens out
Did these NH folk provide any understanding or evidence to their opinion? Or is it just “I heard from a guy that his brother lives in Maine and they pay [bla bla bla bla libertarian point of view bla bla bla]”?
My property taxes in Maine this year were $770
talking specifically about local property taxes (i figure this is only case where it differentiates WITHIN the state itself), it's a combination of desirability (which impacts property values, and thus, taxes), services (low services = low taxes), and the local tax base. in most rural towns, the school budgets make up well over 50% of the entire town's budget (last year, the elementary school in our town was like 65% of the entire town's budget).
there are some weird situations though. i would describe rockland as a more or less "undesirable" town (relative to it's neighbors -- if you can afford to live in Rockport or Camden vs. Rockland, you probably do), which has very high taxes relative to neighboring towns (such as Warren, Thomaston, Hope, Union, etc.)... but they have a lot more services... a police department, more schools, etc. etc.
folks in rockland claim that there are so many non-profits sucking up services, that it shifts the tax base responsibility to homeowners. i'm not sure if there's any validity to that.
Worse
Where people from New Hamster get a tax screwing is if one spouse works in Maine but they live in New Hamster, their entire income is taxed in Maine. They are taxed on income form the spouse who may never even set foot in the State of Maine.
The tax paid is a tax credit in their resident state, but New Hampshire has no state tax so they're screwed.
This works ok in States that have a State tax like Maine and Massachucets.
Well here’s the budget from 2022-2023 at the middle school….
And the Superintendents office for good measure.
And you can click this link to read everything in its entirety.
No thier in the low end of the normal range. We are just also very poor making the taxes hit harder.
I showed you their school board approved 21-24 collective bargaining numbers. The salaries you showed me were proposed but not necessarily approved. If someone in RSU-40 is making that kind of money, they have a doctorate and we’ll over 24 years of experience. They're still underpaid.
Edit: I said 22-23. It's actually 21-24.
Several teachers confirmed that’s what they get paid. That’s their budget. I live in the district. Spoke to staff members.
The tricky part is that individuals often have wildly different lists of items they personally consider wasteful, when talking about waste at the city/county level. As an example, I've talked to folks that feel that locally funded bike paths and other expensive local park system amenities are a waste of their tax dollars.
Most people do not tale advantage of the tax programs they are eligible for. Homestead Exemption for Property Taxes. Student Loan Repayment Credit for Income. There are a lot of programs, and you have to make sure you are getting your moneys worth as well
You’re going to pay for it one way or the other or simply you’re not going to have the services most places have. There’s really nothing more to it.
Less than I paid in Pa
To busy corrupting bears and burning historic buildings.
Let me save you some time. I brought signatures…
NH sucks
That's good, hope more salaries increase. Pay them as professionals and then demand good performance. They live local, so money stays in the local economy, pay people what they are worth. The various workers I dealt with were competent so I pay for that. Maines salaries need to catch up some to the cost of housing. Flowing money into an area via education where teachers, support staff, janitors, bus drivers .ears it all stays local, I see that as opposite of zero sum. It primes the pump some. Tax dollars that come back to the district or county really make a difference in quality of life in an area. I am a woodsy loner and yet admit that.
Overall, yes. At my company our bosses are from away and when I've had problems with payroll over the years I've had them look at my checks and when they have they've always commented on how much we're taxed compared to other company locations they've managed in other states.
Please dear god let a future candidate campaign for lowering taxes on the poor, the service class and working class. We're drowning already without considering taxes.
Yeah agreed, SO many other states don't have it at and they're all fine. Why do we stand for it every year?!
I got 4K back from the state this year so I’m feeling okay with these taxes. I’m also a stem grad working in the stem field so that helps with credits
NH has no state income tax or sales tax, but they do have high property taxes. Everyone is saying that they come out about the same, but, it really depends on your situation.
I’m a relatively high income individual who is a renter, so I definitely make out worse than if I made my same salary in NH. Buy beyond that, salaries in NH are generally higher for my field. Portsmouth vs Portland is a big difference in software pay that I’ve seen, largely because of Boston spillover. Most jobs in Maine do not pay well at all. This state has an array of economic issues and challenges but the wages have to be the most severe, in my opinion.
Also, taxes paid, in and of itself, does not mean much of anything. It’s taxes paid relative to the services that those taxes provide. While MA tax is slightly higher than Maine, they get A LOT more services for those taxes. And the wages are multiple times higher in a lot of cases.
All this to say, I certainly don’t live in Maine for the money. I’m not complaining, but I’m not going to sit here and pretend like the taxes we pay relative to the services we get aren’t fucking shit, cause they are
Maine state gov't spends about $7.7k per person per year. NH state gov't spends about $5k. Not that that answers your question, but I thought it was a useful fact.
Cost of living incorporates taxes and everything kind of washes out and is effectively only modulated by desirability (also a tricky think to nail down).
Ask them how much their property taxes are.
Less than 3k where I live in Maine.
Property tax is worse, though because at least with income tax, you only pay tax on money you have. If you don't make any money, you don't pay taxes. With property tax, you have to keep paying even after your home is paid off, after retirement when you're on a fixed income, or if you lose your job and have no income, the state doesn't care. They will literally take your home that you spent your entire life paying off because you owe property taxes. If you can't tell, I have issues with property taxes. You never really own anything because of them. You're essentially renting from the state.
Yup, it all comes out in the wash while you're still earning a paycheck. Where some states have major advantages in taxes is when you retire and are no longer paying income tax.
We lived in Idaho before moving here, and the taxes seemed a lot higher here.
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No sales tax, no income tax in New Hampshire. Mil rates for property taxes are about 50% higher in NH for comparable towns, and real estate valuations tend to be much higher for similar properties. Excise tax on vehicles is about the same, NH adds a highway fee. Other miscellaneous fees tend to be higher in NH, sometimes significantly. Plus, tickets and fines in NH are higher than Maine. Another part of that equation is ticket revenue explicitly funds law enforcement budget items in NH while in Maine it goes into the general fund, in other words, police are incentivized to write a lot of tickets.
For all that, if you are poor, it is probably a wash. Maine has better services, lack of a sales tax means your money goes further. If you are middle class, fees and property taxes are going to eat up more money than saving on sales and income tax. If you are wealthy, who cares, your money isn't coming from taxable sources in Maine, and while you're paying more in property tax in New Hamshire it evens out.
Yeah, I have lived and paid taxes in PA, NJ, and IL. Maine has been the lightest tax state I've ever lived in as an adult, and that's before you consider property. To put that in perspective, my folks in NJ pay monthly for 0.5 acres what I pay annually for 14.
Yeah house prices suck up everything you've got after paying for your heating/ cooling, food, tax bill. Cost of living is a little higher in "paradise" than, say, Ohio.
Here in Jersey we would have that property tax bill and 7% sales tax. Well close to that, well I just looked ...9 10k ugh
Yeah but how much income tax and sales tax do you pay?
2200 here and haven't gone up by more than 100 bucks in 8 years.
But in Maine, you still pay property tax. Depends on income level, but I pay way more in Maine income tax than the difference would be in property tax.
Edit: I don't understand the downvotes. My home in Maine vs being in NH might cost me like 2k less per year, but I pay way more in Maine income tax than 2 grand.
I can't say, but I can tell you Maine Revenue Services can be very nasty. Do not anger them for they are vengeful gods.
Total state taxes is my question. I can say without a doubt $5,000. for me. Mainers, tell me what you think are your total state taxes.
Welfare is rampant in Maine. It certainly doesn’t help taxes. This is why we need to welcome immigration to people who actually want to work.
I agree. I’ve lived in me, ny, nj, co, and ca, despite the differences in taxes, no one place seemed any more or less expensive when you consider income, etc.
The joke is that you never own your house in NH, you just rent it
Good lord I'm almost tenfold that
Fuck no. Nj & new york was by the far the worst ones I dealt with. Only in the city for new york idk what's the country side like.
When we were in that situation the Maine tax rate was calculated on our combined income but we were taxed only on the income earned in Maine.
State and local tax burden here:
I judge everyone by the amount they bitch about taxes.
No, waterfront home for only $4500 in tax is awesome. I have a small home without driveway or garage in Columbus, OH and taxes are 6K.
Same prop tax here and I pay less than $2k in income taxes. Couldn’t tell you on the sales tax tho
Your sheet includes Salary and Benefits. I believe that means total district cost (health insurance, etc) and not just what the employee is paid
If you are paying 'way more' than $2K in Maine income taxes then you are making WAY MORE than most Mainer's ever will.... which is probably why you are being downvoted. Totally not fair.. but some people do start getting twitchy when 'rich' people bitch about paying income taxes.
But you aren't wrong. The reality is that the mill rate in NH is all over the place.. the same as the mill rates in Maine. In some towns it's $5 in others it's $30.
Everyone says 'oh NH property taxes are so much higher'... and back in the day.. they used to be. MUCH higher. But these days.. not so much.
You're right. Looked it over, and I don't pay way more than 2k. But it's basically a wash. Yeah, I used the 2k number based on towns in each state that I know roughly what the rates are, though you're right that some maine towns absolutely have higher rates than some NH towns
siebzy t1_jbe1jot wrote
No, your co-workers from New Hampshire are brain washed right wing idiots with one (bad) joke.
Some taxes in Maine are higher than in NH (income, general sales). Other taxes are higher in NH (property taxes especially, but also "rooms and meals"). Overall, they end up tying out pretty similar depending on how exactly you do the math and what you do or don't include.
The classic joke is the guy who works in Boston but moves to NH for lower taxes. He gets wrecked because he then has to pay both MA income tax and NH property tax.