Local penny pinchers can rejoice: La Plata County has the fourth-lowest tax burden in the state, according to a study that calculated how much money a roughly representative resident might pay in income, sales, property and fuel tax in each Colorado county.
In more good news for Durango residents, the study also found that La Plata County is among the least-taxed counties in the country. Nationally, it ranked 422 out of the 3,300 counties it analyzed throughout the nation.
According to the study’s methodology, county-by-county comparisons are based on what SmartAsset.com deemed an “average” person: the tax burden of a person who makes the national median household income, $51,939, who owns a $250,000 house, spends 35 percent of his or her take-home pay on taxable goods and drives a study-set average number of miles per year.
Breaking down the “average” La Plata County resident’s tax burden by category, the study found that he or she pays $10,263 in income taxes, $767 in sales tax, $762 in property taxes and $183 in fuel taxes.
Statewide, the “average” Colorado taxpayer pays the same $10,263 toward income taxes that La Plata County residents pay but forks over $899 in sales tax, $1,323 in property taxes and $170 in fuel taxes.
The SmartAsset study concludes that in Colorado, “average” residents of Las Animas County enjoy the lightest tax burden in the state.
Meanwhile, bargain-hunting Colorado taxpayers may wish to avoid moving to Adams County.
Ranked 1,939th in the country, the “average” Adams County resident carries the heaviest tax burden in the state, paying $1,253 in sales taxes, $2,175 in property taxes and $208 in fuel taxes.
cmcallister@ durangoherald.com