R.I. 31st among states for most high earners

CONNECTICUT HAS the highest percentage of taxpayers who make $1 million or more annually at 0.63 percent, according to a study by MoneyRates.com. Rhode Island ranked 31st on the list with 0.18 percent. / COURTESY MONEYRATES.COM
CONNECTICUT HAS the highest percentage of taxpayers who make $1 million or more annually at 0.63 percent, according to a study by MoneyRates.com. Rhode Island ranked 31st on the list with 0.18 percent. / COURTESY MONEYRATES.COM

PROVIDENCE – Rhode Island ranked 31st on a list of states with the most high earners, while Connecticut topped the list and Mississippi placed last.

An analysis by MoneyRates.com found that, on a per capita basis, that Connecticut has more taxpayers who make more than $1 million annually than any other state in the nation at 0.6 percent, representing 63 such earners per 10,000 taxpayers.

In comparison, Mississippi has a higher proportion of taxpayers who earn less than $25,000 annually than any other state at nearly 49 percent, the financial website said.

Rhode Island ranked 31st for having 0.18 percent of taxpayers making more than $1 million annually, and 29th for having 39.8 percent of taxpayers earning $25,000 or less annually.

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The study examined 2013 tax returns across all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia for its income data, discovering that many states varied widely from the national averages for taxpayers with incomes of $1 million or more (0.25 percent of the group) and taxpayers with incomes of less than $25,000 (41 percent of the group).

Richard Barrington, a senior financial analyst for MoneyRates.com and author of the study, said that it should come as no surprise that such concentrations of wealth and poverty exist in various parts of the country.

For example, the Northeast dominates high earners per capita. Following Connecticut, the District of Columbia is second at .55 percent; New York is third at .47 percent; Massachusetts, fourth at .42 percent; and New Jersey, fifth at .4 percent.

Similarly, most of the states that have high proportions of low earners are clustered in the Southeast. After Mississippi, they are, Florida, 46.5 percent; New Mexico, 45.1 percent; Arkansas, 45 percent; Georgia, 44.7 percent; Alaska, 44.7 percent; South Carolina, 44.6 percent; Tennessee, 44.4 percent; and Louisiana, 44.4 percent.

Florida was the only state to make the top 10 for both its proportion of high earners (0.31 percent, placing it ninth) and its proportion of low earners (46.5 percent, placing it second), MoneyRates.com said.

Barrington said that makes Florida far different from many of the other states on the top 10 lists. For instance, the only state to post a higher proportion of poor people than Florida, Mississippi, was nowhere near the top 10 for its proportion of high earners. It stood second-to-last in that category, at 0.12 percent, ahead of only West Virginia at 0.1 percent.

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