Live in Colorado, Work Remotely for a Kansas Employer: Who Taxes You?
Answer
Colorado taxes the income and Kansas cannot. Residency, not the location of the job, drives this answer: Colorado reaches all of a resident's income, and Kansas has no personal income tax to apply to the part earned inside its borders.
Last verified
Crossing into a state with no income tax does not lower your tax bill, because your home state is not taxing you on where you work — it is taxing you on where you live. Colorado reaches all of a resident's income, and Kansas adds nothing on top.
What you file
- 1Resident return · Colorado
File a Colorado resident return reporting all of your income.
The two states, side by side
| Colorado | Kansas | |
|---|---|---|
| Taxes wages | Yes — flat | Yes — graduated |
| Reciprocity partners | None | None |
| Convenience rule | No | No |
| Nonresident return | Form DR 0104 with Schedule DR 0104PN | Form K-40 with Schedule S Part B |
| Credit for other-state tax | Form DR 0104CR | Form K-40 (credit for taxes paid to other states) |
| Nonresident safe harbour | None published | None published |
| Local income tax | Yes | No |
| Revenue department | Colorado Department of Revenue — Taxation Division | Kansas Department of Revenue |
| Last verified |
The other direction
Reversing the commute does not always reverse the answer. Living in Kansas and working in Colorado gives:Home state only.
Same two states, different situation
The withholding answer turns on how you are paid and where the work happens, not only on which two states are involved.
- W-2 commuter: Colorado → KansasBoth states — credit offsets the double tax
- 1099 contractor: Colorado → KansasHome state, plus the client state if you work there
- Moved mid-year: Colorado → KansasTwo part-year returns
Other Colorado pairs
Questions people actually ask
I live in Colorado and work remotely for a Kansas employer. Which state do I pay?
Colorado taxes the income and Kansas cannot. Residency, not the location of the job, drives this answer: Colorado reaches all of a resident's income, and Kansas has no personal income tax to apply to the part earned inside its borders.
Which state should my employer be withholding for?
Colorado. Your employer should withhold Colorado tax rather than Kansas tax on these wages. If a Kansas line is showing on your pay stub, raise it with payroll now rather than at filing time.
Does my Kansas employer's location alone create a Kansas tax obligation?
No. Kansas sources wages to the place where the work is physically performed, and it does not apply a convenience-of-the-employer rule that would override that. Days you actually spend working inside Kansas are a different matter — those are Kansas-source income and can require a nonresident return.
How current is this?
The Colorado and Kansas rules on this page were last checked against Colorado Department of Revenue — Taxation Division and Kansas Department of Revenue on 2026-08-07. We re-check the full grid every December after state legislative sessions close, and re-check the convenience-of-the-employer states quarterly because that is where the rules move fastest.
Sources
Every fact above comes from the revenue department that publishes the rule. We do not cite secondary summaries, and we do not restate a figure we could not find at source.
- Colorado Department of Revenue — Taxation Division — individual income taxaccessed 2026-08-07
- Kansas Department of Revenue — individual income taxaccessed 2026-08-07