Does Utah tax policy discourage marriage?

As a member of the Utah House of Representatives and as the Chair of the Utah Marriage Commission for the last 5 years, I am eager to consider how Utah can correct tax penalties for married couples. A recent Kem C. Gardner Institute report was commissioned by the Utah Marriage Commission.

Released today, the report , “Marriage Penalties in Utah,” is the first to look at how marriage penalties operate specifically in Utah. Previous reports have only analyzed the existence of marriage penalties and disincentives in federal tax policies and public assistance programs. This new report points out that Utah state agencies administer tax benefit programs with dollars that come from Washington (sometimes supplemented with state dollars).



Allocating the funds to needy Utah families comes with federal rules that Utah policymakers have only limited ability to modify. The report from the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute at the University of Utah documents numerous public benefit programs and some tax policies that penalize the choice to marry (and even the choice to live together).

These penalties are most likely to impact choices by lower income couples who experience the most family instability. The report documents marriage penalties in the Social Security Tax Credit, Earned Income Tax Credit, and the Child Tax Credit. The implicit penalties may be even more impactful for lower income families in public benefit programs such as Medicaid, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), and Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF).

The report cannot do the challenging calculations of how these penalties affect a specific family’s financial situation because every family’s situation is unique. However, it does document the reality that, for many lower income families in Utah, it’s possible that the state will be more generous with its public assistance if they are not married. These benefit calculations can be very complex, so it’s challenging for couples to really know on their own how moving in together and/or getting married will affect their benefits.

Yet it only takes a viral TikTok video or a cousin’s sad story to send the message that choosing to marry will cut your benefits (even though in the long run a stable marriage is one of the best financial decisions you will ever make). At a minimum, we should let Utah’s federal delegation know that we support congressional changes putting married couples on par with single tax filers, making it easier to allow state tax policy to align with federal benefits. The most straightforward way to help lower income couples in Utah who want to marry may be for the state to modify its own marriage penalty for the portion of the Earned Income Tax Credit that it adds onto the federal credit (+20%).

As stated in the report, “This direct reliance on federal eligibility introduces a marriage penalty with the income thresholds impacting the maximum credit amount and phaseout ranges.” A second feasible change would be for state policymakers to encourage USU-Logan, USU-Eastern, and UVU to allow tuition benefits for married adults (up to a certain age). Other higher education institutes in Utah already provide this benefit.

Once again, most starry-eyed Utah couples who are thinking about forever together aren’t making calculations about how a legal marriage will affect their tax liability or government benefits they receive. But for too many lower income Utahns who struggle to stretch their budgets each month, the financial effects of a decision to marry is hard to ignore. Here’s a situation some young couples may find themselves in: Dating on-and-off after high school and both working minimum wage jobs, a couple may hope to be married in a few years when things become “more stable.

” They refer to themselves as engaged, but haven’t yet set any date. One or two kids later, they may or may not have steady jobs and/or insurance. Realizing marriage tax penalties may affect their bottom line, putting off marriage may be the financial reason they choose to live together for now and not marry.

Every couple has their own journey, but we know the odds: research tells us that cohabiting couples are much less likely to still be together after five years than are married couples. Still, we can’t know for certain that a marriage license and wedding vows would make it more likely for any individual family to keep their family intact. The larger point is this: if this couple intentionally decides not to marry – despite their wishes – because they’ve heard it would cost them precious dollars in public assistance, then tax and benefit policies should be changed to encourage strong marriages and strong families.

If a public commitment to marriage contributes to the stability of family life and hence the wellbeing of children (and adults and communities), as research suggests, then public policy that makes the choice to marry more costly is unintentionally misaligned with public (and private) interests. Unfortunately, many real Utah couples experience this misalignment. There may be other ways that Utah can better align public policy with its desire to support more and stronger marriages and to encourage the federal government to eliminate these penalties.

After all, the Utah legislature and Governor Cox’s Office of Families has recently invested in promoting other pro-marriage initiatives, such as the “Success Sequence,” with several bills and joint resolutions (HB281 2025; HJR011 2025 ; SJR3 2024; Office of Families “ Prioritizing Marriage ”). As a whole, these encourage four steps encouraging four four steps that dramatically reduce the likelihood of experiencing poverty - including 1. Finish high school.

2. Get a full-time job. 3.

Get married. 4. And then have children.

I can envision a process during 2025 in which Utah legislative committees and various state agency heads digest the report and examine possible ways they could make additional adjustments, perhaps including the recommendations I listed in this article. Eliminating tax and benefit policies that penalize marriage makes sense too. It’s time for Utah to put our (tax) money where our mouth is - and continue to be a national leader in prioritizing the well-being of marriages and families.

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