Friday, November 5, 2010

Why the Yankees help every city of the nation

A fascinating post today by our friends at IATMS (It's About the Money, Stupid) on how state taxes might affect the future size of Cliff Lee's boat.  

Part of it concerns state nonresident income taxes. Check this out.

When Derek Jeter plays in Anaheim or Oakland, he becomes subject to California’s nonresident income tax. If the All-Star Game is held in Chicago, every all-star becomes subject to Illinois’ nonresident income tax. Most baseball teams are located in states with non-resident income taxes. The only exceptions are the Mariners, Marlins, Rays, Astros and Rangers.


You have to pity the poor guy who prepares Derek Jeter’s tax returns (or envy him, since he probably makes a lot of money). Half of Jeter’s Yankees salary is taxed by the State of New York. But Jeter plays 9 games each year in Boston, so Massachusetts gets to tax 1/18 of this income. If Jeter plays three games in Oakland and four in Anaheim, then California gets its share of 7/162 of Jeter’s baseball salary. Of course, these fractions need to be adjusted if Jeter plays in the All-Star game or makes it to the post-season. To make things worse, there are cities such as Cleveland and Philly that impose city income taxes on nonresidents. And when Jeter travels to Toronto … well, let’s leave Canada out of this discussion.

Go there for more.

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