Mississippi's income tax has two rates — 0% and 4% — and the 0% band runs to $10,000 of taxable income. Add a $2,300 standard deduction and a $6,000 personal exemption, and a single filer's first $18,300 of salary is untaxed.
Above that, 4% applies to everything, and Mississippi is on a legislated path to reduce even that.
On $85,000 a single filer pays $2,668 and takes home $65,960.
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; Mississippi's rate, deduction, exemption and retirement rules come from this site's own sourced 50-state dataset, citing Miss. Code Ann. 27-7-5 and 27-7-15(4)(k) and the Department of Revenue's Form 80-105 instructions. Every dollar figure is computed by the same engine the site's calculators use, on a single filer with no dependents or pre-tax deferrals unless stated. Sales tax and property tax are discussed qualitatively.
1. What Mississippi 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 |
| Mississippi income tax | −$2,668 |
| Take-home | $65,960 |
Across incomes, single filer:
| Salary | Mississippi tax | Effective MS rate | Take-home |
|---|---|---|---|
| $30,000 | $468 | 1.56% | $24,817 |
| $45,000 | $1,068 | 2.37% | $37,270 |
| $60,000 | $1,668 | 2.78% | $48,722 |
| $85,000 | $2,668 | 3.14% | $65,960 |
| $120,000 | $4,068 | 3.39% | $89,182 |
| $175,000 | $6,268 | 3.58% | $124,611 |
The statutory rate is 4% and the effective rate never reaches it. At $175,000 it is 3.58%. The $18,300 of untaxed income is the whole of that gap, and it is worth exactly $732 to every Mississippian above the threshold.
Run your own salary against Mississippi's rate2. The structure, in four numbers
Standard deduction: $2,300 single, $4,600 married filing jointly, $3,400 head of household.
Personal exemption: $6,000 single, $12,000 married filing jointly — a deduction from income, not a credit.
Zero bracket: the first $10,000 of taxable income, at every filing status. Note that the zero bracket does NOT double for a couple — it is $10,000 whether you file single or jointly, which is unusual and is why Mississippi's joint benefit is smaller than it first appears.
Rate above that: 4%.
For a single filer on $85,000: $8,300 sheltered by the deduction and exemption, $76,700 of taxable income, the first $10,000 at 0% and $66,700 at 4% — $2,668.
Mississippi is a flat tax with a large floor. Once you are above $18,300 of salary, every additional dollar is taxed at exactly 4%, and your marginal rate never changes again no matter how much you earn.
The rate is scheduled to fall
Mississippi enacted a multi-year reduction path, stepping the 4% rate down over subsequent years toward elimination, with the later steps conditioned on revenue growth targets being met.
Two things worth understanding about that:
The conditional steps are not guaranteed. A schedule that depends on revenue triggers is a schedule that can stall, and planning a thirty-year retirement around a rate that has not yet been reduced is planning around a forecast.
The figures in this article are the 2026 rate. If you are reading this in a later year, check the current rate rather than assuming this one held.
3. Filing jointly
| Salary | Single MS tax | Joint MS tax | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| $30,000 | $468 | $136 | $332 |
| $45,000 | $1,068 | $736 | $332 |
| $60,000 | $1,668 | $1,336 | $332 |
| $85,000 | $2,668 | $2,336 | $332 |
| $120,000 | $4,068 | $3,736 | $332 |
| $175,000 | $6,268 | $5,936 | $332 |
A flat $332 at every income, being 4% of the extra $8,300 of deduction and exemption.
Nothing else doubles. The $10,000 zero bracket applies identically to a single filer and a married couple, so a couple gets no benefit from it at all beyond what a single filer gets.
That makes Mississippi's joint benefit one of the smallest in the country — below Louisiana's $386, well below Kansas's $857, and a fraction of Hawaii's $1,587. Only Arkansas's $97 and Illinois's $145 are smaller among the states in this series.
The practical version: in Mississippi, marriage is worth about $28 a month on your state tax bill.
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 | $1,268.45 |
| Biweekly (26) | $3,269.23 | $2,536.90 |
| Semi-monthly (24) | $3,541.67 | $2,748.31 |
| Monthly (12) | $7,083.33 | $5,496.63 |
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 $5,074 a year.
Form 89-350 is Mississippi's employee withholding exemption certificate, and it asks for a dollar amount of exemption rather than a count of allowances — $6,000 for a single filer, $12,000 for a married couple where only one spouse claims it, and so on. That is a more transparent design than an allowance count, because the number on the form is the number that comes off your income.
Withholding is an estimate, not the tax. Over-withholding produces a refund; under-withholding a bill.
5. Retirement is exempt — but read the condition
Mississippi exempts retirement income more broadly than almost any state, and it attaches one condition that most summaries flatten out of existence.
Everything is exempt:
| Source | Mississippi treatment |
|---|---|
| Social Security | Exempt |
| Railroad Retirement | Exempt |
| Federal Civil Service | Exempt |
| Mississippi PERS | Exempt |
| Highway Safety Patrol Retirement | Exempt |
| Private pension | Exempt |
| Military retirement | Exempt |
| 401(k), 403(b), traditional IRA | Exempt |
There is no public–private asymmetry here at all, which is genuinely rare — this dataset records a public–private split for state after state, and Mississippi has none.
The condition: you must have met the plan's retirement requirements
The Department of Revenue's own wording is the load-bearing part: retirement income, pensions and annuities are generally not subject to Mississippi income tax if the recipient has met the retirement plan requirements. Early distributions are not covered.
What that means in practice:
A distribution taken before you have met your plan's retirement conditions is taxable at 4%, even though the same account will be exempt later.
"Retirement requirements" is the plan's own definition, not a single statutory age. For a 401(k) the relevant threshold is commonly 59½; for a defined benefit plan it may be a combination of age and service.
So the exemption is not "Mississippi does not tax 401(k)s." It is "Mississippi does not tax 401(k) distributions taken in retirement." Someone taking a hardship withdrawal at 45, or a substantially-equal-payments stream at 52, should not assume the exemption applies.
| Retirement income, single | Mississippi tax |
|---|---|
| $40,000 all Social Security | $0 |
| $40,000 from a private pension, retirement requirements met | $0 |
| $40,000 from a 401(k), retirement requirements met | $0 |
| $40,000 early 401(k) distribution, requirements not met | About $868 |
For a retiree who has actually retired, Mississippi is effectively a no-income-tax state — and it is one of the few states where that is true of 401(k) money as well as Social Security. Alabama next door taxes 401(k) withdrawals; so do Kansas, Idaho, Nebraska, North Carolina and North Dakota.
There is no estate or inheritance tax.
6. No local income tax
No Mississippi municipality or county levies an income tax. Miss. Code Ann. 27-7-5 is the sole levy and it is state-level, administered by the Department of Revenue. Nothing in Title 27 chapter 7 authorises a local income tax or a local piggyback, and Forms 80-105 and 80-205 have no locality, city or county field anywhere on them.
A Mississippi take-home figure is complete as stated.
That is worth saying because two states along the Mississippi River do things differently — Missouri has city earnings taxes in St. Louis and Kansas City, and Kentucky has near-universal local occupational license taxes on wages. Mississippi has nothing comparable, and neither does Louisiana next door, whose constitution forbids it.
7. What Mississippi charges instead
Sales tax, and it reaches further than most.
Mississippi taxes groceries at the full sales tax rate. Most states either exempt food for home consumption entirely or apply a sharply reduced rate. Mississippi is one of very few that does neither, and its state grocery rate is among the highest in the country.
That is the single most regressive feature of Mississippi's tax code, and it matters more here than it would elsewhere because Mississippi's median household income is the lowest of the fifty states. A household spending a large share of its income on food pays sales tax on a large share of its income.
Set it against the income tax. A Mississippi household at $30,000 pays $468 in state income tax. If it spends $7,000 a year on groceries, the sales tax on that alone is a comparable figure. The income tax is the smaller of the two for a low-income family, which is the opposite of what a state-by-state income tax comparison implies.
Local sales tax is limited. Mississippi's local option is narrower than Louisiana's or Alabama's, so combined rates are closer to the state rate than in most Southern states — a genuine difference and one that partly offsets the grocery treatment.
Property tax is comparatively low, and Mississippi's homestead exemption reduces it further for owner-occupiers.
Homeowners insurance on the Gulf Coast is the cost that dwarfs all of these, as it does in Louisiana. Anyone weighing a move to the coastal counties should price that before pricing the tax.
8. Where Mississippi ranks
At $85,000, Mississippi's $2,668 is ninth-lowest of the 41 income-tax states.
| State | Tax on $85,000 |
|---|---|
| Louisiana | $2,164 |
| Indiana | $2,478 |
| Rhode Island | $2,571 |
| Iowa | $2,578 |
| Pennsylvania | $2,610 |
| Mississippi | $2,668 |
| Arkansas | $2,799 |
| New Mexico | $2,834 |
Against its four neighbours:
| Salary | MS | LA | AL | AR | TN |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| $30,000 | $468 | $514 | $1,235 | $654 | $0 |
| $45,000 | $1,068 | $964 | $1,985 | $1,239 | $0 |
| $85,000 | $2,668 | $2,164 | $3,985 | $2,799 | $0 |
| $175,000 | $6,268 | $4,864 | $8,485 | $6,309 | $0 |
Mississippi is dramatically cheaper than Alabama at every level — $1,317 at $85,000 and $2,217 at $175,000 — which is a large gap between two neighbouring states with similar economies. Alabama's top 5% rate begins at $3,000 of taxable income; Mississippi's 4% begins at $18,300 of salary.
And Mississippi beats Alabama on retirement too. Alabama exempts pensions but taxes 401(k) withdrawals as ordinary income; Mississippi exempts both.
Louisiana is cheaper above $30,000, and Tennessee takes nothing at all.
9. Two things this figure leaves out
Mississippi's return carries features that the table in section 1 does not model, and both run in the taxpayer's favour.
Dependent exemptions. Mississippi allows an additional exemption per dependent, subtracted from income in the same way the $6,000 personal exemption is. A household with children shelters more than the figures here show, and at 4% each dependent exemption is worth a straightforward percentage of its amount.
The additional exemption at 65. Mississippi allows an extra exemption for a taxpayer aged 65 or over, and another for blindness — again as deductions from income rather than credits.
Neither is in the tables above, because the tables model a single filer with no dependents. Both mean the real figure for a household is lower than the illustration, never higher, which is the direction an illustration should err in.
Mississippi's filing threshold is low
Because the exemption and deduction together shelter $8,300 and the zero bracket covers the next $10,000, a single filer earning under $18,300 owes no Mississippi tax. But owing nothing is not the same as not filing — Mississippi's filing requirement is keyed to gross income against the exemption amounts, and someone below the tax threshold may still be required to file, particularly if tax was withheld and they want it back.
Anyone who had Mississippi tax withheld and earned under the threshold is owed a refund they will not receive unless they file. That is true in most states and it is worth naming here because Mississippi's threshold is high enough relative to its median wage that a meaningful number of people fall under it.
And a fourth Mississippi-specific point about that threshold. Because the zero bracket, the standard deduction and the exemption all stack, Mississippi's untaxed floor of $18,300 for a single filer is higher than several states with lower headline rates manage. Pennsylvania taxes from the first dollar at 3.07%; Illinois shelters $2,925 against 4.95%; Arkansas shelters $2,470 against a 3.9% top rate. Mississippi's 4% looks worse than all three on the rate line and better than all three at $30,000 of income.
That is the whole argument for reading bills rather than rates, and Mississippi is one of the clearest illustrations of it in the country.
10. What you can control
Pre-tax deferrals save 4% at state level for anyone above $18,300 of salary. A $10,000 traditional 401(k) contribution saves an $85,000 earner $2,200 federally plus $400 in Mississippi tax.
And if you retire in Mississippi, that 4% is saved permanently rather than deferred — provided you meet your plan's retirement requirements before drawing on it. That makes the traditional-over-Roth case unusually strong here, second only to Illinois's among the states in this series.
The condition in section 5 is the thing to protect. A traditional deferral in Mississippi is a state tax exemption if you draw it in retirement and a state tax deferral if you draw it early. Those are very different outcomes from the same account.
HSA contributions through payroll cut federal tax, Mississippi tax and FICA. On $4,400 that is roughly $968 federal, $176 Mississippi and $337 FICA — about $1,481, or 34% of the amount contributed.
Capital gains get no state preference. The instruction booklet states it directly: Mississippi generally follows federal rules on computing gains and losses, but does not have different tax rates for capital gains — all income is taxed at the same rate.
Frequently asked questions
What is Mississippi's income tax rate? Two rates: 0% on the first $10,000 of taxable income and 4% above it. With a $2,300 standard deduction and a $6,000 exemption, a single filer's first $18,300 of salary is untaxed.
What is take-home pay on $85,000 in Mississippi? $65,960 for a single filer, after $9,870 federal income tax, $6,503 FICA and $2,668 Mississippi income tax.
Does Mississippi tax retirement income? No — Social Security, private and public pensions, military retirement, 401(k)s and IRAs are all exempt, with no public–private distinction. But only once you have met your retirement plan's requirements; early distributions are not covered.
What counts as meeting the retirement requirements? The plan's own definition, not a single statutory age. For a 401(k) that is commonly 59½; for a defined benefit plan it may combine age and service. A hardship withdrawal or an early distribution stream is taxable at 4%.
Can a Mississippi city or county tax my income? No. Miss. Code Ann. 27-7-5 is the sole levy and it is state-level. Forms 80-105 and 80-205 have no locality field.
How much is the joint filing benefit in Mississippi? $332 a year at every income — 4% of the extra $8,300 of deduction and exemption. The $10,000 zero bracket does not double for a couple, which is why the benefit is so small.
Are groceries taxed in Mississippi? Yes, at the full sales tax rate, which is unusual — most states exempt food for home consumption or tax it at a reduced rate. It is the most regressive feature of the state's tax code.
Is Mississippi cheaper than Alabama? Substantially. $2,668 against $3,985 at $85,000, and $6,268 against $8,485 at $175,000 — and Mississippi exempts 401(k) withdrawals in retirement where Alabama taxes them.
What to do next
Mississippi's income tax is modest and its retirement exemption is among the broadest in the country. The condition attached to that exemption is the part worth reading twice.
- Mississippi take-home pay calculator — your salary with every deduction shown separately.
- Your Paycheck in the USA in 2026 — all fifty states on one salary.
- Take-Home Pay in Alabama — the neighbour that costs substantially more.
- Take-Home Pay in Louisiana — cheaper still, with a constitutional bar on local income tax.
- 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 with no dependents or pre-tax deferrals unless stated. Federal figures come from IRS Revenue Procedure 2025-32 and the Social Security Administration; Mississippi's rate, deduction, exemption and retirement rules from this site's sourced 50-state dataset, citing Miss. Code Ann. 27-7-5 and 27-7-15(4)(k) and the Mississippi Department of Revenue. The scheduled rate reductions, 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.