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For years, CFI has worked with partners across Colorado to fight for a tax system that better reflects our values, asks more of those with the greatest ability to pay and gives working families a fairer deal. That work helped bring Amendment 87 to the ballot this year. Through Protect Colorado’s Future, we’re proud to stand alongside advocates and organizations across the state pushing for a tax code that invests in our communities and works better for everyone, not just the highest earners.
Amendment 87 would replace the state’s flat income tax with a graduated income tax. It would lower income tax rates on the first $100,000 of taxable income, keep the current rate on income between $100,000 and $500,000 and raise rates on taxable income above $500,000. The state’s official analysis estimates that 97% of taxpayers would receive an income tax cut.
There are a lot of claims flying around about what Amendment 87 would mean for seniors, veterans, small businesses, TABOR refunds and Colorado’s economy. You may have seen them in an ad, mailer, text message or your group chat.
We reviewed the underlying tax rules, census data, state revenue data, official fiscal analyses and research on what happened when other states changed taxes on high incomes. This page breaks down what Amendment 87 actually changes, what it does not change and what the research says about some of the claims you may be hearing.
You do not have to take anybody’s political message at face value. Look at the numbers, check the sources and decide for yourself. For more information about Amendment 87 and the coalition supporting it, visit ProtectColoradosFuture.com.
| Colorado Taxable Income | Current Rate | Amendment 87 Rate |
|---|---|---|
| $25,000 or less | 4.4% | 3.7% |
| $25,001 to $100,000 | 4.4% | 4.2% |
| $100,001 to $500,000 | 4.4% | 4.4% |
| $500,001 to $750,000 | 4.4% | 7.4% |
| $750,001 to $1,000,000 | 4.4% | 7.9% |
| $1,000,000 or more | 4.4% | 8.4% |
For the overwhelming majority of seniors, no.
99.5% of Coloradans age 65 or older had personal income below $500,000 in 2024, according to CFI’s analysis of American Community Survey data.
What Amendment 87 does not change:
Amendment 87 changes the tax rates applied after taxable income is calculated. It does not suddenly make previously untaxed retirement income taxable.
Amendment 87 changes Colorado’s income tax rates; it does not eliminate the deductions and subtractions Colorado already provides for Social Security, pensions and qualifying military retirement benefits.
For example, imagine a 68-year-old retiree receives $40,000 in Social Security benefits. Colorado law allows taxpayers age 65 and older to subtract all of their federally taxable Social Security benefits when calculating Colorado taxable income. Amendment 87 does not change that subtraction. If that Social Security income is excluded from Colorado taxable income today, changing the tax rate applied to taxable income does not suddenly make those excluded dollars taxable.
Bottom line
If income is not included in your Colorado taxable income today, Amendment 87 does not make it taxable simply because the tax rates change.
Sources: U.S. Census Bureau, 2024 American Community Survey and Colorado Department of Revenue guidance on Social Security, pensions and annuities.
For the overwhelming majority of veterans, no.
CFI’s analysis of 2024 American Community Survey data found:
361,600 of approximately 364,500 Colorado veterans, or 99.2%, had personal income at or below $500,000.
Amendment 87 also does not eliminate Colorado’s existing tax treatment for qualifying military retirement income.
The measure changes the rates applied to taxable income. It does not change the underlying rules determining what counts as taxable income.
Bottom line
Nearly all Colorado veterans fall below the income level where Amendment 87’s higher rates begin, and the measure does not eliminate existing military retirement tax provisions.
No.
The state’s official analysis says Amendment 87 would have no impact on current TABOR refunds or the mechanisms used to calculate them.
Here’s how it works:
Revenue Colorado would have collected under the existing tax system:
Still counts toward the TABOR limit.
Additional revenue created by Amendment 87:
Exempt from the TABOR limit and dedicated to the purposes listed in the measure.
Bottom line
Amendment 87 changes one part of TABOR, the requirement that taxable income be taxed at one rate. It does not repeal TABOR or eliminate the existing refund system. A tax filer can expect between $43 to $137 in TABOR rebates in 2027 whether Amendment 87 passes or not.
Researchers found that millionaires do show some sensitivity to tax rates, but it’s much smaller than most people imagine. When they move, they’re somewhat more likely to move to lower-tax states. But millionaires are not especially mobile in the first place. Their annual migration rate was only about 2.4%, lower than that of the general population.
Another study examined New Jersey’s 2004 millionaire tax, which raised rates on top earners by 2.6 percentage points, to 8.97%. The study found a slight uptick in the number of millionaires who left New Jersey, resulting in the loss of $16 million in tax revenue, but the state gained $1 billion from those who remained. Put differently, the revenue loss from supposed wealth flight was less than 2% of the revenue gained.
The 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act created a natural experiment by capping the federal deduction for state and local taxes, or SALT, at $10,000. This widened the effective tax difference between high-tax states and states without income taxes by about 3.1 percentage points, creating a substantial financial incentive for millionaires to relocate. For someone earning $2 million a year, that increased the financial incentive to relocate by roughly $60,000 annually. If taxes truly drove large-scale millionaire migration, this should have been the moment it happened.
Yet researchers found very little migration in response. A 1-percentage-point increase in tax differences reduced a state’s millionaire population by just 0.2% to 0.3%. California lost an estimated 380 millionaires out of 81,000, or roughly 0.5% of its millionaire population. The findings suggest that millionaires are far less responsive to state income taxes than commonly claimed, largely because their businesses, careers, families and social networks tie them to where they live.
It turns out millionaires also like places with strong economies, including educated workforces, quality public services and infrastructure. They are, and have remained, concentrated in states with the highest taxes. From 2010 to 2023, states with millionaire taxes, along with Washington, D.C., went from having an average of 1.2 more millionaires than the country as a whole to 2.3 more.
Bottom line
Higher taxes may cause a small number of wealthy households to move, but research does not show the large-scale “wealth flight” often predicted when states raise taxes on very high incomes. States with higher taxes on millionaires have still seen their millionaire populations grow.
Source: Young and Lurie, 2025; Kleven et al., 2020; Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center, 2026; Maine Center for Economic Policy, 2026.
Most would receive a tax cut.
There are about 730,887 small businesses in Colorado, representing 99.5% of businesses in the state. But “small business” describes the size of a business, not how it pays income taxes.
| Business Type | How Income Is Taxed | What Matters Under Amendment 87 |
|---|---|---|
| Pass-through business | Business income passes through to the owner’s personal tax return | The business owner’s taxable income |
| C corporation | The corporation files its own income tax return | The corporation’s taxable income |
Key numbers
Bottom line
Most small businesses fall below the income level where higher tax rates begin, but how Amendment 87 affects a business depends on how that business is taxed.
Sources: Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade; U.S. Census Bureau, 2024 ACS microdata; Bell Policy Center analysis
Because Amendment 87 uses marginal brackets, these lower rates apply to the first portions of taxable income for everyone, not just taxpayers earning less than $100,000.
Bottom line
The state’s official analysis estimates that 97% of taxpayers would receive a tax cut.
Because $500,000 is where the higher marginal bracket begins.
But taxpayers also receive the lower rates Amendment 87 creates on their first $100,000 of taxable income. Those savings offset the higher rate on the first dollars above $500,000. The result:
$500,000
Higher marginal rate begins.
$510,834
Approximate point where the taxpayer's total state income tax becomes higher than under current law.
Bottom line
The bracket starts at $500,000. The overall tax increase starts around $510,834.
The brackets are not automatically indexed to inflation.
That means nominal income growth could cause more income to fall into higher brackets over time.
But that does not mean a typical middle-income taxpayer is about to hit the $500,000 bracket.
Campaign analysis estimates that at 3% annual inflation, it would take more than 50 years for a taxpayer earning $100,000 today to reach another bracket solely through nominal income growth.
Research underway
CFI is conducting additional analysis of bracket creep and the long-term effect of inflation on Amendment 87’s brackets. This section will be updated when that analysis is complete.
About $2 billion annually in a full fiscal year under the current state forecast.
You may also see $2.7 billion associated with Amendment 87. These numbers describe different things.
|
Figure |
What it means |
|
Up to $2.7 billion |
Maximum annual tax increase stated in the ballot title |
|
$958.4 million |
Legislative Council estimate for FY 2026-27 |
|
$1.972 billion |
Estimate for FY 2027-28 |
|
$2.086 billion |
Estimate for FY 2028-29 |
Bottom line
$2.7 billion is the maximum stated in the ballot title. Current nonpartisan forecasts estimate collections closer to $2 billion in a full fiscal year.
Revenue raised by Amendment 87 is not a blank check for politicians. The measure restricts the new revenue to three areas:
The money must be kept in a separate fund and is subject to accountability requirements, including annual reporting and an independent audit.
Colorado is facing growing budget pressure even before accounting for all of the new costs being shifted to the state.
The September 2026 revenue forecast showed that Colorado could be about $1.58 billion short of its required reserve in fiscal year 2027-28 after accounting for obligations under current law. Those pressures include rising Medicaid costs, school finance, capital spending and other existing commitments.
Federal policy changes are adding to that strain. H.R. 1 shifted new costs for programs including SNAP and Medicaid onto states. CFI has estimated that Colorado could face roughly $130 million in new SNAP costs, while restrictions affecting federal Medicaid funding could create an additional $105 million General Fund obligation that could grow substantially over time.
New Medicaid work requirements also create administrative burdens and costs for states while putting coverage at risk for people who may struggle to navigate reporting requirements.
Learn more about Colorado’s budget challenges:
Colorado Legislative Council Staff: 2026 State Ballot Information Booklet
Colorado Legislative Council Staff: Amendment 87
Colorado Legislative Council Staff: 2026 Fiscal Impact Statements
Ballotpedia: Colorado Amendment 87
Young, Cristobal, Charles Varner, Ithai Z. Lurie, and Richard Prisinzano. “Millionaire Migration and Taxation of the Elite: Evidence from Administrative Data.” American Sociological Review 81, no. 3 (2016): 421-446.
Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade: Colorado Small Business Data
U.S. Census Bureau: 2024 American Community Survey Public Use Microdata
Colorado Department of Revenue, 2023 Statistics of Income: C Corporations.
Bell Policy Center analysis of Amendment 87 business tax impacts.
Colorado Department of Revenue: Social Security, Pensions, and Annuities
See our nonpartisan, objective ballot education resource, Count Me In! for reliable, plain-language information on every measure on the ballot. Count Me In is a robust civic engagement effort that partners with communities across the state to share resources on the decisions they will see on their ballots. Our focus is to spark community conversations about the power we have to influence the public investments that shape our communities.
Visit Just Vote Colorado to find answers to frequently asked questions, learn about your voting rights and more. Call the Election Protection hotline (866-OUR-VOTE) or NALEO’s Spanish-speaking voter hotline (888-VE-Y-VOTA) for additional assistance or to report issues. Help is available in 11 languages including ASL. Just Vote Colorado Election Protection is a non-partisan voter assistance project and is not affiliated with or promoting any party, candidate, or ballot issue.
You can register to vote in Colorado all the way up to and on Election Day. Register online, check or update your registration, and find a polling place at Go Vote Colorado.
More questions? Reach out to Caitlin Schneider, schneider@coloradofiscal.org, for research requests or to schedule a presentation.
