Maryland vs Virginia Taxes and Every Other State Pair (2026)

TL;DR: 30 reciprocal income-tax agreements exist between the 51 jurisdictions in the reciprocity matrix, and they cover 2.35 percent of the 1,275 state pairs a travel nurse can move between. 35 of the 51 are in no agreement with anyone. The most-searched pair in the group carries the same top rate on both sides, 5.75% in Maryland and Virginia, and it is the only one of the 30 agreements where the two rates match, so that question is not decided by a rate. On the other side, New Jersey and Pennsylvania sit 7.68 points apart, the widest span any agreement covers. And the clock in the published Mid-Atlantic wording is tighter than most people plan for: two back-to-back 13-week contracts in one state are 182 calendar days, one day inside the 183-day test.

What the Comparison Actually Turns On

Two states divide up one nurse’s wages in three different ways. Which one applies changes both how many returns you file and whose rate ends up following the paycheck.

Reciprocity: one state, one return

Under a reciprocal agreement the two states agree that the state where you live taxes the wages and the state where you work gives up its claim. The Tax Foundation study behind the table below describes that as the states forgoing revenue from each other’s residents, leaving them taxed exclusively by the state they live in. That is the whole benefit, and for a nurse it is usually worth more than the rate difference: one return instead of two, and no credit calculation to file.

The credit system: two returns, and the higher rate follows you

With no agreement, the work state taxes what you earned inside its borders, your home state taxes all of it too, and your home state then hands you a credit for what you already paid the other one. The arithmetic lands on the higher of the two top rates and you file twice either way. This is the answer for most pairs on this page, because most pairs have no agreement.

The reverse credit: the same bill, a different collector

A few states flip the direction of that credit and collect the whole bill where you work, then credit what you already paid the state you live in. Arizona, California, Indiana, Oregon and Virginia work that way for at least some of the nonresidents who cross into them, and none of those five holds an agreement with another one of them. Maryland goes the other way: Maryland Administrative Release No. 3 says a nonresident from Arizona, California, Indiana, Virginia, West Virginia and the District of Columbia can no longer claim a credit on the Maryland return at all, and must claim it on the resident return of the state where they are domiciled. For a nurse the arithmetic comes out the same as the ordinary credit system either way: two filings and the higher of the two top rates. The collector changes, the bill does not.

Everything below is one of those three systems applied to a pair of states, which is why the honest answer to “which state taxes me less” is usually “the one you live in, if there is an agreement, and the higher one if there is not.”

The Six Pairs Nurses Actually Search

These are the pairs that show up as searches, ranked by how often, with the same license priced on both sides so the tax question sits next to the pay question. Read the last column first: it is the practical answer, and it depends on which end of the pair you live in, which is the part a generated summary has no way to know.

Top rate is the highest marginal rate on wages published for that state in the table on the travel nurse taxes by state guide, dated 2026-09-13. Nurse hourly is the BLS May 2025 average for registered nurses in each state, both states on the same release. The return count assumes you really are a resident of the first state in each pair.

Two of the six have an agreement. Four do not, and two of those four are pairs where at least one side taxes no wages at all. On those pairs the answer is a rule rather than a rate, which is why nurses keep searching them.

Maryland vs Virginia Taxes: The Pair Where the Rate Is Not the Question

People search this pair more than any other on the list, and the number they are comparing is the same number on both sides: 5.75% top rate on wages in Maryland and the identical 5.75% in Virginia. No other agreement among the 30 has two matching rates inside it. So the answer is not a rate. It is which state collects, how many returns you file, and whether you still qualify.

Virginia's own reciprocity page names five partners (the District of Columbia, Kentucky, Maryland, Pennsylvania and West Virginia) and states the tests for the Mid-Atlantic ones plainly: present in the other state for 183 days or less, no abode such as a house or apartment there, and wage or salary income only. Maryland Administrative Release No. 3 puts the same limit slightly differently: the exemption is lost by someone who keeps a place of abode in the non-domiciliary state for more than six months and is physically present there for 183 days or more, with the West Virginia agreement excepted from the clock entirely.

Read together, those two wordings point at the one thing a travel nurse should check before assuming the exemption applies. Virginia lists the abode as a separate test, so a furnished apartment at the assignment can end the exemption on its own, at 91 days, without anyone counting anything. Maryland couples the abode to the day count, so the same apartment is only fatal past six months. The safe reading is the strict one: an apartment at the assignment is the risk, not the three-month count, and the two states describe it differently enough that you should read both before relying on either.

The District is the clearest case in the pair, because it is not a reciprocity question at all. The District may not tax nonresident wages, so a Virginia resident working in the District is taxed by Virginia and by nothing else, and the 10.75% District rate never touches that nurse. Maryland and Virginia residents commuting to District assignments are in the same position, and Maryland Administrative Release No. 3 lists the District among Maryland's four written agreements.

The pay side is not a tie. Registered nurses average $47.60 an hour in Maryland against $45.12 in Virginia, $2.48 more, so a 36-hour week pays $1,714 in Maryland and $1,624 in Virginia. Maryland's top federal lodging ceiling is $306 a night at Ocean City, Virginia's is $262 at Wallops Island. Same rate, different money, and the difference is not in the tax line.

Connecticut and New York: The Agreement Everyone Cites Was About Sales Tax

440 searches a month across four spellings of this pair, and the answer is that the two states have no reciprocal income-tax agreement. The instrument that keeps being cited by that name is the 1988 Reciprocal Agreement between Connecticut and New York, which New York notice N-09-16 describes as being for the exchange of tax information and cooperative tax administration. New York terminated it in 2009, and what survived was the 1982 arrangement for passing sales and use tax reporting back and forth. Nothing in either one touches income tax on a nurse's wages.

So the credit system applies: 6.99% in Connecticut against 10.90% in New York, 3.91 points apart, and the higher one follows the work. New York's 10.90% is the third-highest top rate on wages in the country, behind California's 13.30% and Hawaii's 11.00%. A Connecticut tax home with a New York assignment files a nonresident New York return and a Connecticut resident return, and settles at the New York rate; the same nurse working in Connecticut while living in New York files in both and settles at the higher one there too. Neither direction has an agreement to fall back on.

The pay side runs the other way, which is why the pair gets searched. Registered nurses average $50.60 an hour in Connecticut against $54.54 in New York, $3.94 more, and the top tenth in New York reaches $75.52 against $64.84 in Connecticut. New York carries 205,810 registered nurse jobs against Connecticut's 40,110. The housing line splits the same way: New York's top federal lodging ceiling is $358 a night at New York City, while Connecticut's is $156 at Bridgeport / Danbury: the lowest ceiling of the eleven states on this page, and less than half the New York figure.

Pennsylvania and New Jersey: The Widest Gap Any Agreement Closes

90 searches a month, and this is where the difference is largest: 3.07% against 10.75%, 7.68 points, the widest span inside any of the 30 agreements. The typical agreement in the list separates 1.62 points, so this pair is worth almost five times the usual spread.

A Pennsylvania tax home with a New Jersey assignment is the case the agreement exists for. If you meet the conditions, New Jersey gives up the wages, Pennsylvania's 3.07% applies, and there is one return. Without the agreement the same nurse ends at 10.75% and files twice, which is why this pair is worth checking properly rather than assuming.

Unusually, the pay and the tax point in the same direction here. Registered nurses average $52.93 an hour in New Jersey against $45.20 in Pennsylvania, $7.73 more, so the higher-paying state is also the higher-taxing one, and the agreement is what decides which side of that you land on. New Jersey is also the narrowest partner on the whole list: it offers reciprocity with exactly one state, and that state is Pennsylvania. The only wider-looking spread after this one is Minnesota and North Dakota, 7.35 points, where Minnesota offers reciprocity with two states and North Dakota with two.

Arizona, California and Nevada: No Agreement, and a Reverse Credit Instead

70 and 90 searches a month sit on the western pairs, and none of Arizona, Nevada or California is party to any reciprocal agreement. This is the exact example the Tax Foundation study uses to explain reverse credits: an Arizona resident working in California pays Arizona tax on the income, California credits it, and because California taxes higher she still owes California the difference. Two states, two filings, the higher rate.

10.80 points separate 2.50% from 13.30%. The Nevada and California pair is wider still at the full 13.30, because Nevada's top rate on wages is zero: a Nevada tax home working in California files one return, in California, and owes Nevada nothing. That is the cleanest outcome on this page, and it comes from Nevada taxing no wages rather than from any agreement between states.

California is where the money is, which is why anyone asks. Registered nurses average $72.25 an hour there against $47.95 in Arizona and $50.82 in Nevada: $24.30 and $21.43 of a gap, the two widest pay gaps on this page, in a state with 338,940 registered nurse jobs. Federal lodging ceilings reach $325 a night at San Francisco in California, against $282 at Sedona in Arizona and $183 at Incline Village / Reno / Sparks in Nevada.

Florida and Texas: two zeros

50 searches a month, and both states tax no wages, so there is no winner on this axis: 0.00% in Florida, 0.00% in Texas, no agreement needed and none on file. Nine of the 51 jurisdictions sit at zero on wages: Alaska, Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Washington and Wyoming. The rest of the difference between Florida and Texas lives in sales tax and property tax, which this page does not compare, because a nurse on a 13-week contract is not buying a house in either state.

The 183-Day Cliff, in Contract Arithmetic

The published Mid-Atlantic conditions turn on days and on an abode, and a travel contract is measured in both. A 13-week assignment is 91 calendar days.

• One contract: 91 days, with 92 days of room under the 183-day test.
• Two back-to-back contracts in the same state: 182 days, inside the test by exactly 1 day.
• A third contract: 273 days, past it by 90, and since six months of a 365-day year is 182.5 days, the same assignment trips the Maryland abode clock as well.
• Maryland and West Virginia is the exception: Maryland Administrative Release No. 3 says that agreement applies however long either side keeps an abode or stays present.
• The Kentucky and District arrangements are the tightest of all, because Virginia's page frames them as crossing the border every day, which a nurse living at the assignment for three months is not doing.

None of that makes reciprocity useless on a travel contract. It makes it a question to answer before the agency sets up withholding rather than after, because the remedy for wrong-state withholding is a refund claim with the state that took the money. Virginia's page says so directly, and it tells its own residents to have the employer withhold Virginia tax instead.

Why 35 Jurisdictions Have No Agreement at All

The 30 agreements sit in a corridor running from the Mid-Atlantic to the Mountain West: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, New Jersey, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin and the District of Columbia. Kentucky is in more of them than anyone, at seven partners, while Iowa, Montana and New Jersey each offer reciprocity with a single state. Everyone else is on their own: 35 of the 51 jurisdictions are party to nothing, including all three Pacific-coast states and all nine that tax no wages. A nurse moving between two states that have no deal is always in the credit system, whatever the rates look like.

So the practical test before picking up a second state is a short one: does either end of the assignment appear in the table below, paired with the other? If not, plan for two filings and the higher rate.

The eight pairs marked as quoted are the ones this page read at source: Maryland’s Administrative Release No. 3 covers its four agreements and the Commonwealth of Virginia’s reciprocity page covers its five. The other 22 exist in the Tax Foundation matrix, which carries the statute behind each one, but their eligibility wording was not read and is not implied here.

Frequently Asked

Do I pay state income tax in both states?

Only if both states tax wages and neither has an agreement with the other. With an agreement, the work state gives up the wage income and you file at home. Without one, you file in both and the credit system settles the total at the higher top rate. If your home state taxes no wages there is nothing to credit, and you file only where you worked.

Does a reciprocal agreement apply to a travel nurse?

Only to a nurse who really is a resident of the other state, which is the same tax-home question the rest of this site keeps asking. The agreements cover wage and salary income only, and Virginia's page adds that you must not keep an abode in the state you are working in: a furnished apartment paid for by a housing stipend is an abode. Read the wording for your specific pair before counting on the exemption.

How many 13-week contracts can I work in one state before reciprocity dies?

Two, if you stay inside the day tests: 182 calendar days against the 183-day line. The third contract is where the exemption stops applying in every agreement that carries that test, except the Maryland and West Virginia one.

What is the difference between a credit and a reciprocal agreement?

A credit fixes double taxation after the fact: both states assess you, one hands money back, and you still file twice. An agreement prevents the second assessment in the first place, so you file once. Same paycheck, very different April.

Which states have no income tax on wages?

Nine: Alaska, Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Washington and Wyoming. Two of them changed recently: Tennessee’s tax on interest and dividends ended for income from 2021, and New Hampshire repealed its interest and dividends tax for tax years beginning in 2025. A zero rate on wages is still not the same as no tax at all, so read the state’s own rules before you treat one as the other.

My agency withheld the wrong state's tax. What do I do?

Fix the certificate with the employer for the rest of the assignment, then file a return in the state that withheld to claim it back. Virginia's page says exactly that for its own pairs. Once the year has three or four states on it, a preparer who has done multi-state returns before is worth shopping for, and the going rate for that work is on this site.

Does this change what happens to my per diem?

No. These agreements divide up taxable wages. The stipend is a separate question, decided by whether you keep a tax home, not by which two states are involved.

Before You Sign the Contract

Five questions, in order, for any assignment that crosses a state line:

1. Which state is my tax home this year? Everything below depends on the answer, and a long assignment is exactly what makes it ambiguous.
2. Does my tax home appear in the agreement table above, paired with the assignment state? If not, budget for two returns.
3. Will I keep an abode at the assignment, and for how long? A furnished apartment on a stipend counts, and the published clocks are six months and 183 days.
4. What will the agency withhold? Ask to see the state on the pay stub before the first pay check lands, not after the first quarter closes.
5. Which top rate actually applies to me? Use the tool above, and remember it prints the top marginal rate, not your bill.

Sources: the reciprocity matrix and the reverse-credit discussion from the Tax Foundation study dated 2022-11-16; the Commonwealth of Virginia reciprocity page and Maryland Administrative Release No. 3, both read on 2026-10-07; New York Department of Taxation notice N-09-16 on the terminated Connecticut agreement; the 50-state top-rate table this site published on 2026-09-13; BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics for May 2025 for every wage figure; and the GSA FY2027 master rate file for every lodging ceiling. Reciprocal agreements are amended without warning and residency is decided on facts rather than forms. Educational information, not personal tax advice.

Sources we checked

Every figure on this page came from one of the documents below, not from another blog. Links checked 10 October 2026.

• IRS - State government websites: The standing list of every state revenue department, which is where a nonresident return actually gets filed.
• Virginia Department of Taxation: Virginia's 2026 rates and the nonresident return a Maryland-side commuter files.
• Tax Foundation - state individual income tax rates: The top marginal rates the state-by-state comparisons quote.
• Tax Foundation - Do Unto Others: state income tax reciprocity (16 Nov 2022): The reciprocity matrix this site counts as 30 states with a deal and 35 without one.