This Map Reveals How Much The 1 Percent Makes In Each State
Have you ever wondered how much someone considered the top 1 percent makes? There's a map that'll tell you.
What does it take to be in the “top 1 percent” of earners? How much more money would you have to earn? Unsurprisingly, that salary level varies depending on where you live. A new map has broken down how much you need to earn in each state to be considered a be a member of the top 1% in the United States.
SmartAsset, an investment adviser, wanted to find out how much income someone has to earn to be considered in the the top 1 percent of earners in each state. To find these details, they used IRS data from 2019 to see what the biggest earners had in common, Digg notes. With the data, SmartAsset adjusted figures to 2022 dollars using data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI Index and put the salary thresholds for each state into an easy-to-read map.
“The average American household earns a median income of under $70,000, but in some places, the top 1 [percent] can earn as much as $974,000,” SmartAsset explains. “Those annual earnings can seem far out of reach in a country where less than 10% of all households earn more than $200,000, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.”
So, what did their data show? That being in the top 1 percent is hard to achieve.
There’s only one state where you’ll need to make more than $900,000 to be considered that top 1 percent, and that prize goes to Connecticut. “The top 1% of taxpayers here have the highest average tax burden (27.77%),” SmartAsset writes, which is close to $60,000 more than the next highest state to be in the top 1%.
In contrast, the state that has the lowest threshold to land in the top 1 percent is in West Virginia. The top 1 percent of earners there make $374,700, followed by Mississippi, in which the top 1 percent has to earn $383,100 a year to meet the threshold.
States with the highest threshold for “1 percent” status:
- Connecticut, at $955,300
- Massachusetts, at $896,900
- New Jersey, at $825,965
- New York, at $817,796
- California, at $805,519
States with the lowest threshold for “1 percent” status:
- West Virginia, with $374,712
- Mississippi, at $383,128
- New Mexico, at $418,970
- Arkansas, at $446,276
- Kentucky, at $447,300
For more details, check out the whole map and SmartAsset.
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