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Excise to Excess: States that Make You Pay

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excise taxes per capita

The Tax Foundation has released a map displaying the ranking and dollar/citizen each state pulls in via excise taxes. Excise taxes are usually placed on goods that consumers can’t avoid, like gasoline, or goods that governments would prefer consumers avoid, like cigarettes or alcohol (also called Sin Taxes). Policy makers are attempting to generate maximum revenue, while also achieving some other goal, i.e. preventing cancer or reducing emissions. The Tax Foundation writes:

State and local governments rely on a variety of tax types to raise revenue, one of which is the excise tax. Like general sales taxes, excise taxes are paid on the purchase of an item. Unlike sales taxes, excise taxes are collected on specific types of transactions, not a wide range of general goods. Some of the most common excise taxes include gas taxes,cigarette taxes, and taxes on the purchase of beer, wine, and liquor. Others include taxes on the purchase of amusements, insurance premiums, and pari-mutuels.

This week’s map looks at combined state and local excise tax collections per capita in each state. On average, $535 per person was collected in each state in fiscal year 2013 (including local governments).

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E.J. Smith

Editor-in-Chief
E.J. Smith is Founder of YourSurvivalGuy.com, Managing Director at Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd., a Managing Editor of Richardcyoung.com, and Editor-in-Chief of Youngresearch.com. E.J. graduated from Babson College in Wellesley, Massachusetts, with a B.S. in finance and investments. In 1995, E.J. began his investment career at Fidelity Investments in Boston before joining Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd. in 1998. E.J. has trained at Sig Sauer Academy in Epping, NH. His first drum set was a 5-piece Slingerland with Zilldjians. He grew-up worshiping Neil Peart of the band Rush, and loves the song Tom Sawyer—the name of his family’s boat, a Grady-White Canyon 306. He grew up in Mattapoisett, MA, an idyllic small town on the water near Cape Cod. He spends time in Newport, RI and Bartlett, NH—both as far away from Wall Street as one could mentally get. The Newport office is on a quiet, tree lined street not far from the harbor and the log cabin in Bartlett, NH, the “Live Free or Die” state, sits on the edge of the White Mountain National Forest. He enjoys spending time in Key West and Paris. Please get in touch with E.J. at ejsmith@youngresearch.com.

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