Ohio collected $34.9B in state taxes in 2021, 9th highest in country

CLEVELAND, Ohio – Ohio, the nation’s seventh-largest state, collected the ninth highest amount of taxes in 2021, at $34.9 billion, a 14.1% increase from 2020, according to data released from the U.S. Census Bureau.

Overall, there was a 19% increase in state government taxes nationally for a total of $1.3 trillion, or more precisely, $1,271,508,842,000. The U.S. Census Bureau, in issuing its report late last week, reported these numbers in thousands, rounding the numbers in the hundred range. Ohio’s total was listed at $34,909,388,000.

California, by far the largest state in terms of population, collected the most with $248.2 billion, followed by New York ($93.5 billion), Texas ($65.4 billion), Illinois ($55.5 billion), Pennsylvania ($49.6 billion), Florida ($49.4 billion), New Jersey ($43.7 billion), Massachusetts ($36.3 billion), and Ohio.

The largest increases from 2020 to 2021 were in Utah (44.66%), California (43.8%), Colorado (24.83%), Oregon (34.53%), Michigan (23.14%), Illinois (22.63%), North Carolina (22.61%), Montana (22.47%), and Rhode Island (22.33%).

The U.S. Census Bureau publishes this data in the Annual Survey of State Government Tax Collections, which summarizes taxes collected by each state for five broad tax categories and up to 25 tax subcategories.

The five broad categories are property taxes, sales and gross receipts taxes, license taxes, income taxes, and other taxes, like death and gift taxes, severance taxes, and documentary and stock transfer taxes.

The data include tax collections of state governments only; they do not include those of local governments. Because Ohio’s property tax is determined and collected by the county and local governments, it is not included.

However, even if you remove property taxes from each state for comparison, the rankings for the top states do not change.

Ohio collected the most taxes from the sales and gross receipt taxes, for a total of $22.1 billion, an 8.96% increase from 2020. These include taxes on general and selective sales, alcoholic beverages, insurance premiums, public utilities, and tobacco.

The largest increase in taxes collected for any category is a 201% increase in public utilities license taxes from $1 million in 2020 to $3 million in 2021. This is followed by alcoholic beverages license taxes (74.31%), corporations’ net income taxes (61.99%), and individual income taxes (28.70%).

The statistics do not include employer and employee assessments for retirement and social insurance purposes. Also excluded are the states’ unemployment compensation tax collection.

View the chart below for a full breakdown of state taxes collected in Ohio. Total taxes and major tax categories are bolded. Some mobile users may need to use this link.