Live in South Carolina, Work Remotely for a Massachusetts Employer: Who Taxes You?
Answer
South Carolina taxes the income and Massachusetts cannot. Residency, not the location of the job, drives this answer: South Carolina reaches all of a resident's income, and Massachusetts has no personal income tax to apply to the part earned inside its borders.
Last verified
The instinct that working in a no-tax state means paying no tax is the single most expensive misunderstanding in this niche. Massachusetts takes nothing, but South Carolina still taxes residents on income earned anywhere, so the full amount lands on your South Carolina return.
What you file
- 1Resident return · South Carolina
File a South Carolina resident return reporting all of your income.
The two states, side by side
| South Carolina | Massachusetts | |
|---|---|---|
| Taxes wages | Yes — graduated | Yes — flat |
| Reciprocity partners | None | None |
| Convenience rule | No | No |
| Nonresident return | Form SC1040 with Schedule NR | Form 1-NR/PY |
| Credit for other-state tax | Form SC1040TC | Schedule OJC |
| Nonresident safe harbour | None published | None published |
| Local income tax | No | No |
| Revenue department | South Carolina Department of Revenue | Massachusetts Department of Revenue |
| Last verified |
The other direction
Reversing the commute does not always reverse the answer. Living in Massachusetts and working in South Carolina 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: South Carolina → MassachusettsBoth states — credit offsets the double tax
- 1099 contractor: South Carolina → MassachusettsHome state, plus the client state if you work there
- Moved mid-year: South Carolina → MassachusettsTwo part-year returns
Other South Carolina pairs
Questions people actually ask
I live in South Carolina and work remotely for a Massachusetts employer. Which state do I pay?
South Carolina taxes the income and Massachusetts cannot. Residency, not the location of the job, drives this answer: South Carolina reaches all of a resident's income, and Massachusetts has no personal income tax to apply to the part earned inside its borders.
Which state should my employer be withholding for?
South Carolina. Your employer should withhold South Carolina tax rather than Massachusetts tax on these wages. If a Massachusetts line is showing on your pay stub, raise it with payroll now rather than at filing time.
Does my Massachusetts employer's location alone create a Massachusetts tax obligation?
No. Massachusetts 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 Massachusetts are a different matter — those are Massachusetts-source income and can require a nonresident return.
How current is this?
The South Carolina and Massachusetts rules on this page were last checked against South Carolina Department of Revenue and Massachusetts 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.
- South Carolina Department of Revenue — individual income taxaccessed 2026-08-07
- Massachusetts Department of Revenue — individual income taxaccessed 2026-08-07