Louisiana's income tax is now one of the lightest in the country, and its constitution makes sure no parish can add to it.
The rate is a flat 3% — lower than every other flat-rate state except Arizona — applied above a $12,875 standard deduction for a single filer. And Article VII, Section 4(C) of the Louisiana Constitution of 1974 provides that a political subdivision of the state shall not levy a severance tax, income tax, inheritance tax, or tax on motor fuel.
On $85,000 a single filer pays $2,164 and takes home $66,464 — the fourth-lowest state income tax bill in the country at that salary.
A note before you start. This is general education, not tax advice. Federal figures are tax year 2026, from IRS Revenue Procedure 2025-32 and the Social Security Administration; Louisiana's rate, deduction and retirement rules come from this site's own sourced 50-state dataset, citing the Louisiana Constitution, La. R.S. 47:44.1 and the Department of Revenue's Form IT-540 and Schedule E instructions. Every dollar figure is computed by the same engine the site's calculators use, on a single filer taking the standard deduction with no dependents or pre-tax deferrals unless stated. Sales tax and property tax are discussed qualitatively.
1. What Louisiana takes
| Amount on $85,000 | |
|---|---|
| Gross salary | $85,000 |
| Federal income tax | −$9,870 |
| Social Security (6.2%) | −$5,270 |
| Medicare (1.45%) | −$1,233 |
| Louisiana income tax | −$2,164 |
| Take-home | $66,464 |
Across incomes, single filer:
| Salary | Louisiana tax | Effective LA rate | Take-home |
|---|---|---|---|
| $30,000 | $514 | 1.71% | $24,771 |
| $45,000 | $964 | 2.14% | $37,374 |
| $60,000 | $1,414 | 2.36% | $48,976 |
| $85,000 | $2,164 | 2.55% | $66,464 |
| $120,000 | $3,214 | 2.68% | $90,036 |
| $175,000 | $4,864 | 2.78% | $126,015 |
The statutory rate is 3% and the effective rate never reaches it. Even at $175,000 it is 2.78%. Only Arizona, Ohio and North Dakota take less at $85,000.
Run your own salary against Louisiana's flat rate2. The deduction, and the head-of-household surprise
| Filing status | Standard deduction |
|---|---|
| Single | $12,875 |
| Married filing jointly | $25,750 |
| Married filing separately | $12,875 |
| Head of household | $25,750 |
Head of household gets the full joint amount, not an intermediate one.
That is genuinely unusual. In almost every other state head of household lands somewhere between single and joint — Kansas puts it at $6,180 against $3,605 and $8,240; Idaho at $24,150 against $16,100 and $32,200; Hawaii at $12,000 against $8,000 and $16,000.
Louisiana gives a head-of-household filer the same shelter as a married couple, which is worth $386 a year relative to the single amount at 3%.
For a single parent, that makes Louisiana one of the more favourable states in the country on this specific point — and it is exactly the kind of detail that a rate comparison never surfaces.
One consequence for the tables in this article: every figure shown for a single filer would be identical for a head-of-household filer at the same income if their deduction matched, but it does not — a head-of-household filer on $85,000 pays $1,778, the same as the married-joint figure, not $2,164.
3. Filing jointly
| Salary | Single LA tax | Joint LA tax | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| $30,000 | $514 | $128 | $386 |
| $45,000 | $964 | $578 | $386 |
| $60,000 | $1,414 | $1,028 | $386 |
| $85,000 | $2,164 | $1,778 | $386 |
| $120,000 | $3,214 | $2,828 | $386 |
| $175,000 | $4,864 | $4,478 | $386 |
A flat $386 at every income, being 3% of the extra $12,875 of deduction. There are no brackets to widen, because there is only one bracket.
That is one of the smallest joint benefits in this series — Hawaii's is $1,587, Minnesota's $1,264, Kansas's $857 — and the reason is arithmetic rather than policy: at a 3% rate, doubling a $12,875 deduction simply cannot be worth much. A low rate makes every deduction cheap, including the ones you want to be generous.
4. What the paycheck actually looks like
On $85,000 as a single filer:
| Pay schedule | Gross per cheque | Net per cheque |
|---|---|---|
| Weekly (52) | $1,634.62 | $1,278.15 |
| Biweekly (26) | $3,269.23 | $2,556.30 |
| Semi-monthly (24) | $3,541.67 | $2,769.32 |
| Monthly (12) | $7,083.33 | $5,538.65 |
Biweekly and semi-monthly are not the same thing. Biweekly is 26 cheques — every other Friday — so two months a year carry three paydays. Semi-monthly is 24, on fixed dates, so every month carries exactly two. The annual total is identical; the monthly cash flow is not, and a biweekly earner budgeting on "two cheques a month" is under-counting by $5,113 a year.
Form L-4 is Louisiana's withholding certificate. Because the 2025 reform replaced a graduated schedule with a flat rate and a much larger deduction, a Louisiana L-4 filed before that change is very likely producing the wrong withholding. Under the old structure, allowances mapped to a set of personal exemptions that no longer exist in the same form.
If you have not touched your L-4 since Louisiana went flat, that is the single most worthwhile thing on this page for you.
Withholding is an estimate, not the tax. Over-withholding produces a refund; under-withholding a bill.
5. The constitutional bar on local income tax
No Louisiana parish, city, town or district levies a personal income tax, and none may.
This is a constitutional prohibition rather than merely an absence of enabling legislation, which is a stronger form of the answer than most states can give.
Article VII, Section 4(C) of the Louisiana Constitution of 1974 provides that a political subdivision of the state shall not levy a severance tax, income tax, inheritance tax, or tax on motor fuel.
Three things follow:
A Louisiana take-home figure needs no local asterisk, and that is provable rather than assumed. Compare Kentucky, where local occupational taxes on wages are near-universal, or Missouri, where St. Louis and Kansas City levy earnings taxes.
It cannot change by ordinary legislation. A parish that wanted an income tax would need a constitutional amendment, which requires legislative supermajorities and a vote of the people.
The same clause bars local severance and inheritance taxes, which tells you something about what the 1974 convention was worried about: it was protecting the state's own tax bases from local competition, and the income tax protection is a side effect that ordinary earners benefit from.
The trade-off is visible elsewhere. Louisiana's local governments are funded largely by sales tax, and because they cannot reach income, they reach consumption hard. That is section 8.
6. Retirement: full exemption for some, $12,000 for everyone else
Louisiana draws one of the starker public–private lines in this series, and the dataset's own note calls it about as stark as it gets.
Social Security is fully exempt. Louisiana begins from federal AGI, so any federally taxable portion of benefits enters the base and is removed under Schedule E code 07E — no threshold, no age condition.
Public, federal and military pensions are exempt IN FULL — no cap, no age condition, no income limit.
Private pensions, 401(k)s, 403(b)s and traditional IRAs share a single $12,000 exclusion, available only from age 65.
| Source | Louisiana treatment |
|---|---|
| Social Security | Exempt in full |
| Louisiana state or local government pension | Exempt in full |
| Federal civil service pension | Exempt in full |
| Military retirement | Exempt in full |
| Private pension | $12,000 at 65+, shared |
| 401(k), 403(b), traditional IRA | $12,000 at 65+, shared |
Two details that matter:
The $12,000 is shared, not stacked. A retiree with both a private pension and 401(k) withdrawals gets $12,000 in total, not $12,000 for each.
It is per taxpayer. A couple both aged 65 or over gets $24,000. La. R.S. 47:44.1 exempts twelve thousand dollars of annual retirement income received by an individual sixty-five years of age or older.
And the figure doubled recently. It was $6,000; Act 11 raised it to $12,000. Any source quoting $6,000 is out of date, and the error runs in the direction of overstating a retiree's tax.
| Retirement income at 65+, single | Louisiana tax |
|---|---|
| $40,000 all Social Security | $0 |
| $40,000 from a Louisiana state pension | $0 |
| $40,000 all 401(k) withdrawals | About $454 |
| $70,000 — $30,000 SS + $40,000 401(k) | About $454 |
Even the unfavourable case is cheap, because the rate is 3%. That is the general shape of Louisiana's income tax: the exclusions matter less than they would elsewhere, because there is not much tax to exclude yourself from.
Under 65 there is no exclusion at all for private retirement income, so an early retiree pays 3% on the whole of a 401(k) withdrawal.
7. Where Louisiana ranks
At $85,000, Louisiana's $2,164 is fourth-lowest of the 41 income-tax states.
| State | Tax on $85,000 |
|---|---|
| North Dakota | $377 |
| Ohio | $1,621 |
| Arizona | $1,731 |
| Louisiana | $2,164 |
| Indiana | $2,478 |
| Rhode Island | $2,571 |
Against its three neighbours:
| Salary | LA | MS | AR | TX |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| $30,000 | $514 | $468 | $654 | $0 |
| $45,000 | $964 | $1,068 | $1,239 | $0 |
| $60,000 | $1,414 | $1,668 | $1,824 | $0 |
| $85,000 | $2,164 | $2,668 | $2,799 | $0 |
| $175,000 | $4,864 | $6,268 | $6,309 | $0 |
Louisiana is cheaper than both Mississippi and Arkansas at every level above $30,000, and the gap widens with income — $1,404 against Mississippi and $1,445 against Arkansas at $175,000.
At $30,000 Mississippi is cheaper, because its $10,000 zero bracket does more at the bottom than Louisiana's flat 3% behind a larger deduction. The two cross over between $30,000 and $45,000, which is the recurring lesson of this series.
Texas takes nothing, and the Louisiana–Texas border is a real labour market — Shreveport, Lake Charles and the whole I-10 corridor. $2,164 a year at $85,000 is the full cost of that border, or about $180 a month.
8. What Louisiana charges instead: sales tax, heavily
Because parishes and municipalities cannot tax income, they tax consumption — and Louisiana's combined state and local sales tax rate is among the highest in the United States, competing with Tennessee for the top spot by average combined rate.
Three consequences worth naming:
The rate varies enormously by parish. Louisiana's local sales tax layer is unusually large relative to the state rate, so the total you pay depends heavily on where you shop. Two parishes can differ by several percentage points.
It is administered locally. Louisiana is one of the few states where sales tax collection is not fully centralised, which is a compliance burden for businesses and, indirectly, a cost embedded in prices.
It is regressive, and the low income tax makes it more so. A household spending nearly all of what it earns pays sales tax on nearly all of it. The 3% income tax saving relative to Mississippi or Arkansas is a few hundred dollars a year at middle incomes; the sales tax difference can exceed it.
Property tax is comparatively low, and Louisiana's homestead exemption removes a substantial portion of a primary residence's assessed value from the taxable base — one of the more generous such exemptions in the country. For a homeowner, that is a genuine offset.
Insurance is the real cost. Louisiana's homeowners insurance premiums are among the highest in the nation, driven by hurricane exposure, and for a Gulf Coast homeowner that annual bill dwarfs both the income tax and the property tax. A relocation decision that weighs the 3% income tax and ignores the insurance premium is weighing the wrong number.
9. What the 2025 reform changed
Louisiana's income tax looked very different two years ago, and the change is recent enough that a great deal of published guidance still describes the old system.
What Louisiana had: a graduated schedule with several brackets, a much smaller standard deduction, and a set of personal exemptions and dependent credits layered on top. It also allowed a deduction for federal income taxes paid — a feature only a handful of states have ever offered, and one that made Louisiana's effective rate depend on your federal bracket.
What Louisiana has now: a single flat rate of 3%, a standard deduction of $12,875 single and $25,750 joint, and no federal income tax deduction.
Three things follow for anyone reading older material:
Comparisons written before the reform are not merely stale — they describe a different structure. A guide that walks through Louisiana's brackets is describing a schedule that no longer exists.
The federal-tax deduction is gone, which matters most to higher earners, who deducted the most under it. For them the flat rate is less of a cut than the headline suggests.
The standard deduction grew substantially, which matters most to lower earners. A single filer at $30,000 now pays $514; under a graduated schedule with a small deduction the figure would have been higher.
And your L-4 is the practical consequence. A withholding certificate completed under the old system maps allowances to exemptions that no longer work the same way. Section 4 says this too, and it is worth saying twice.
Whether the reform made Louisiana cheaper depends on where you sit. For most wage earners at ordinary salaries it did. For someone with a large federal tax bill who was deducting it, less clearly so.
10. What you can control
Pre-tax deferrals save 3% at state level on top of your federal rate. A $10,000 traditional 401(k) contribution saves an $85,000 earner $2,200 federally plus $300 in Louisiana tax.
That $300 is among the smallest state-level deferral savings available anywhere — Oregon's is $875, Hawaii's $760, Kansas's $558. The case for deferring in Louisiana is almost entirely federal, which simplifies the decision considerably.
And the reverse case is worth noting. Someone who defers in a high-tax state and retires to Louisiana takes a large deduction now and pays 3% later — with a $12,000 exclusion on top from 65. That is a favourable direction and it is part of why Louisiana appears on retirement-relocation lists.
HSA contributions through payroll cut federal tax, Louisiana tax and FICA. On $4,400 that is roughly $968 federal, $132 Louisiana and $337 FICA — about $1,437, or 33% of the amount contributed.
Capital gains get no state preference. Louisiana taxes them as ordinary income at 3% — the return begins from federal AGI, which includes net gain in full, and no exclusion or preferential rate applies.
Update your L-4 if it predates the flat-rate reform. See section 4.
Frequently asked questions
What is Louisiana's income tax rate? A flat 3% on income above the standard deduction — $12,875 single, $25,750 married filing jointly or head of household.
What is take-home pay on $85,000 in Louisiana? $66,464 for a single filer taking the standard deduction, after $9,870 federal income tax, $6,503 FICA and $2,164 Louisiana income tax.
Why is my effective Louisiana rate below 3%? Because the $12,875 deduction comes off first. At $85,000 the effective rate is 2.55%; at $30,000 it is 1.71%. It never reaches 3% at any income.
Can a Louisiana parish or city tax my income? No, and it is a constitutional bar rather than merely an absence of legislation. Article VII, Section 4(C) of the 1974 Constitution provides that a political subdivision shall not levy an income tax.
Does head of household really get the same deduction as a married couple? Yes — $25,750, the full joint amount rather than an intermediate one. That is unusual and worth $386 a year against the single figure.
Does Louisiana tax retirement income? Social Security and public, federal and military pensions are exempt in full. Private pensions, 401(k)s and IRAs share a $12,000 exclusion from age 65 — per taxpayer, and shared rather than stacked across sources. The figure was $6,000 before Act 11 doubled it.
How does Louisiana compare with Texas? Texas takes nothing, so $2,164 at $85,000 is the full cost of the border — about $180 a month. Louisiana's sales tax is also higher, though its property tax and homestead exemption run the other way.
Is Louisiana a low-tax state? On income tax, clearly — fourth-lowest of the 41 states that levy one. On sales tax it is near the top nationally, and homeowners insurance premiums are among the highest in the country. The overall picture depends heavily on whether you own a house near the coast.
What to do next
Louisiana's income tax is low, flat, and constitutionally protected from local addition. The costs that actually decide a move here are sales tax and insurance, neither of which appears on a pay stub.
- Louisiana take-home pay calculator — your salary with every deduction shown separately.
- Your Paycheck in the USA in 2026 — all fifty states on one salary.
- Louisiana home insurance — the bill that usually outweighs the tax question.
- Take-Home Pay in Texas — the no-income-tax neighbour to the west.
- 50/30/20 budget calculator — built on take-home rather than salary.
Every figure on this site is sourced and dated. How we source every number.
Figures in this article are illustrations computed by this site's own tax engine for tax year 2026, on a single filer taking the standard deduction with no dependents or pre-tax deferrals unless stated. Federal figures come from IRS Revenue Procedure 2025-32 and the Social Security Administration; Louisiana's rate, deduction, constitutional local-tax bar and retirement rules from this site's sourced 50-state dataset, citing Article VII Section 4(C) of the Louisiana Constitution, La. R.S. 47:44.1, and the Louisiana Department of Revenue. Sales tax, property tax and insurance costs are discussed qualitatively rather than computed. This is general education and not tax advice; consult a licensed tax professional for your own situation.