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New Mexico's High Wage Jobs Tax Credit: The Refundable Incentive That Rewards a Grant County Payroll

Published by Gila Economic Data Atlas Jul 10, 2026

The Job Training Incentive Program (JTIP) and the Local Economic Development Act (LEDA) help a company stand up an operation. The Rural Job Tax Credit then rewards each job that persists. There is a fourth New Mexico incentive that many Grant County employers overlook, and it is arguably the most valuable of the four for a company that pays well: the High Wage Jobs Tax Credit. It returns a share of your actual payroll every year for four years, and unlike most credits it is refundable, so you can collect it as cash from the state even in a year when you owe no New Mexico tax.

This guide explains what the credit is, what wage a Grant County job has to clear to qualify, how much the credit is worth, why the refundable design matters, and how the application runs. It reflects the credit as set out in Section 7-9G-1 NMSA 1978 and administered by the New Mexico Taxation and Revenue Department (TRD). Tax statutes and forms change, so treat this as an orientation and confirm the current terms with TRD before you build the credit into a budget.

What the High Wage Jobs Tax Credit is

The High Wage Jobs Tax Credit is a state credit for creating new, well paid jobs at an economic base employer. Under Section 7-9G-1 NMSA 1978, the credit equals 8.5 percent of the wages and benefits paid for each new high-wage job, and it is capped at $12,750 per job per qualifying period. A qualifying period is the twelve months that begin on the day an eligible employee starts in a new high-wage job. An employer can claim the credit for the initial qualifying period plus three consecutive periods that follow, for a total of up to four years on a single job.

The credit is applied against the employer’s modified combined tax liability, which is the state gross receipts tax, compensating tax, and withholding tax the business reports to TRD. The feature that sets it apart comes next: if the approved credit is larger than that liability, the statute directs that the excess be refunded to the taxpayer. The credit does not simply sit as a carryforward waiting for a future tax bill. It pays out.

The wage a Grant County job has to clear

The credit is only for high-wage jobs, and New Mexico sets the bar by the size of the community where the job is based. Under Section 7-9G-1, a new high-wage job must pay at least:

  • $40,000 a year if the job is performed or based in a municipality with a population of less than 60,000, or in the unincorporated area of a county.
  • $60,000 a year if the job is performed or based in, or within ten miles of, a municipality with a population of 60,000 or more.

Silver City had a population of 9,704 at the 2020 Census, far below the 60,000 line, and Grant County is a micropolitan area with no municipality anywhere near that size. A job based in Silver City, in Bayard, Hurley, or Santa Clara, or in the unincorporated county falls under the $40,000 threshold. That lower bar is a real advantage for a rural employer: a salary that clears the rural threshold in Grant County would fall short of the $60,000 required in Albuquerque or Las Cruces.

How much a Grant County job is worth

The math is a straight percentage of pay, up to the annual cap. Because the credit is 8.5 percent of wages and benefits, the $12,750 per job cap is reached at roughly $150,000 in annual compensation. Below that, the credit scales with what you actually pay.

A simplified illustration for a Silver City employer: suppose you create a new job that pays $50,000 a year in wages. At 8.5 percent, that is about $4,250 in credit for the first qualifying period. If the job stays filled and eligible across the initial period and the three that follow, the same job can generate a credit in each of four years, on the order of $17,000 over the life of the claim if pay holds steady. Create ten such jobs and the credit can reach into six figures across four years. This is an illustration only. The actual credit depends on TRD approval, on each job meeting the qualifying rules each period, on the wages actually paid, and on the $12,750 annual cap. Do not treat the figure as a promise.

What counts as a new high-wage job

The credit is built for economic base employers, the kind of company that sells outside the region and brings new money into New Mexico rather than recirculating local spending. In broad terms, an eligible employer is one that makes a substantial share of its sales to buyers outside the state, or that qualifies through the other categories the statute names, and the job must be a genuinely new position that increases the employer’s total number of workers over the prior year. A job created only by shifting an existing employee, or by getting a job that another New Mexico employer already claimed, does not qualify.

Those eligibility tests, the definition of an eligible employer, the treatment of benefits in the wage calculation, and the exact measurement of the year over year employment increase, carry specific statutory language and periodic TRD interpretation. Confirm them in writing with TRD for your filing year before you rely on them.

Why the refundable design matters

Most tax credits are only as useful as the tax you owe. A nonrefundable credit larger than your liability leaves value stranded, to be carried forward if the rules allow. The High Wage Jobs Tax Credit is different. Because the statute refunds the excess, a young company that is not yet profitable, or one whose gross receipts and withholding liability is small relative to its payroll, can still receive the full value of the credit as a cash refund from the state.

That is the practical contrast with the Rural Job Tax Credit, which offsets state level tax and carries any unused balance forward rather than paying it out. The two credits reward different things. The Rural Job Tax Credit rewards the durability of a job in a rural area. The High Wage Jobs Tax Credit rewards the level of the wage. A Grant County employer paying good salaries should evaluate both.

The credit was just extended to 2036

Timing matters here, and the news is good for anyone planning a project now. Under the prior statute the High Wage Jobs Tax Credit was set to close to new jobs created on or after July 1, 2026. In the 2026 legislative session the state passed Senate Bill 151, an omnibus tax package, and Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham signed it on March 11, 2026. The law extends the credit’s eligibility window by ten years, so new high-wage jobs created before July 1, 2036 remain eligible. A Grant County job created today is inside the window rather than just outside it.

How to claim it

The High Wage Jobs Tax Credit is claimed with TRD. An employer files an application for approval of the credit with the department once per calendar year, on the department’s forms, together with the supporting employee eligibility detail and a claim form. The filing comes after the close of a qualifying period, meaning after the twelve months that follow an eligible employee’s start date, and the statute sets an outer deadline tied to the end of the calendar year in which the final qualifying period closes. Because the forms and the exact filing windows are set by TRD and updated from time to time, pull the current High Wage Jobs Tax Credit application package from the department and confirm the deadlines before you file.

How it stacks with the other incentives

The four core programs work at different moments in a project’s life, and a single new Grant County job can touch more than one:

  • LEDA can help fund the building or infrastructure at the start. See our guide to NM LEDA and JTIP for Grant County.
  • JTIP reimburses a share of wages while the new hire is trained, a one time benefit over the training window.
  • The Rural Job Tax Credit returns up to $4,000 per job over four qualifying periods, applied against state tax and carried forward if unused. See the Rural Job Tax Credit guide.
  • The High Wage Jobs Tax Credit returns 8.5 percent of wages, up to $12,750 per job per year for four years, and refunds any excess as cash.

For a company standing up a well paid economic base operation in Silver City, the sequence can be LEDA and JTIP at the front, then the Rural Job Tax Credit and the High Wage Jobs Tax Credit running in parallel year by year on the same jobs. Our incentives overview lays out the full set.

Verify before you budget

Every figure above is drawn from Section 7-9G-1 NMSA 1978, the 2026 extension in Senate Bill 151, and the administering agencies as of July 2026. Credit percentages, the wage thresholds, the population cutoff, the eligible employer tests, and the filing deadlines can be amended by the Legislature or reinterpreted in TRD guidance from year to year. Before you commit this credit to a pro forma, confirm the current terms with TRD, and confirm your company’s eligibility as an economic base employer, so the numbers in your plan match the numbers the state will actually approve.

Sources

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