Live in Delaware, Work Remotely for a Missouri Employer: Who Taxes You?
Answer
Delaware taxes the income and Missouri cannot. Residency, not the location of the job, drives this answer: Delaware reaches all of a resident's income, and Missouri 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. Delaware reaches all of a resident's income, and Missouri adds nothing on top.
Missouri also has a layer below the state one, and it is the layer that survives every agreement: Kansas City and St. Louis each levy a one per cent earnings tax on wages earned inside the city, collected by the city. Nonresidents pay it on the portion of work performed there.
What you file
- 1Resident return · Delaware
File a Delaware resident return reporting all of your income.
The two states, side by side
| Delaware | Missouri | |
|---|---|---|
| Taxes wages | Yes — graduated | Yes — graduated |
| Reciprocity partners | None | None |
| Convenience rule | Yes — general rule | No |
| Nonresident return | Form PIT-NON | Form MO-1040 with Form MO-NRI |
| Credit for other-state tax | Schedule I (Form PIT-RES) | Form MO-CR |
| Nonresident safe harbour | None published | None published |
| Local income tax | Yes | Yes |
| Revenue department | Delaware Division of Revenue | Missouri Department of Revenue |
| Last verified |
The other direction
Reversing the commute does not always reverse the answer. Living in Missouri and working in Delaware gives:Convenience-of-the-employer rule — both states tax you.
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: Delaware → MissouriBoth states — credit offsets the double tax
- 1099 contractor: Delaware → MissouriHome state, plus the client state if you work there
- Moved mid-year: Delaware → MissouriTwo part-year returns
Other Delaware pairs
Questions people actually ask
I live in Delaware and work remotely for a Missouri employer. Which state do I pay?
Delaware taxes the income and Missouri cannot. Residency, not the location of the job, drives this answer: Delaware reaches all of a resident's income, and Missouri has no personal income tax to apply to the part earned inside its borders.
Which state should my employer be withholding for?
Delaware. Your employer should withhold Delaware tax rather than Missouri tax on these wages. If a Missouri line is showing on your pay stub, raise it with payroll now rather than at filing time.
Does my Missouri employer's location alone create a Missouri tax obligation?
No. Missouri 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 Missouri are a different matter — those are Missouri-source income and can require a nonresident return.
How current is this?
The Delaware and Missouri rules on this page were last checked against Delaware Division of Revenue and Missouri 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.
- Delaware Division of Revenue — individual income taxaccessed 2026-08-07
- Missouri Department of Revenue — individual income taxaccessed 2026-08-07