State tax after moving

We live in NY. In 2020 our daughter finished school in MA and got a job there. Since she spent about 98% of her time in MA last year and is no longer a student nor our dependent, she plans to file as a full year MA resident.

In previous years she has filed as a NY resident, paying taxes on income from a NY summer job and some investment income. In 2020 she did some work for the NY employer remotely from MA but it was so little that they withheld no state income tax and only about $1 of "NY Dis. Ins."

She will of course file a MA state return, but should she file a zero income non-resident NY state return to let them know she's moved, or is that overkill? I suppose the reasonable thing to do is to file in MA, and if NY asks where's her tax return, tell them she moved.

Regards, John Levine, snipped-for-privacy@taugh.com, Taughannock Networks, Trumansburg NY Please consider the environment before reading this e-mail.

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If she received a W-2 showing NY wages, she should file a NY return. The next question is whether to file as a part-year resident or full-year nonresident. This is a facts and circumstances determination. I (and NYS) might argue that she was a NY resident until she graduated and took the job in MA. The reasoning is that she was temporarily absent from her domicile (NY) attending school and that she intended to return to NY up until the date that she was hired in MA.

Even if she claims that she was a NY non-resident for the entire year, she will still have some NY tax liability. NY calculates her tax liability as a fraction of the tax she would owe if all of her income including the MA job was subject to NY tax. NY is also one of the most aggressive states in pursuing tax collections.

Ira Smilovitz, EA Leonia, NJ