Tax Year 2023: The Same IRA Dollars, Spread Across More People

Educational only. This describes public statistics about populations. Nothing here changes what you personally must withdraw. For your situation, consult your CPA.

Americans pulled $432.2 billion in taxable IRA distributions in tax year 2023. In tax year 2022 they pulled $432.1 billion. On a base that size, the two years differ by about $20 million — a rounding error, four one-thousandths of one percent.

That would be an unremarkable line in a table, except for what happened underneath it. The number of tax returns reporting an IRA distribution rose by 242,170, up 1.5 percent to 16.6 million. Same pot of money, more hands in it. The average amount per recipient fell.

The IRS released the tax year 2023 state and county files in late August 2026 — past both the August 13 date on its original calendar and a revised August 21 target. This is what is in them.

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In short: Taxable IRA distributions were flat between tax year 2022 and tax year 2023 — $432.1 billion to $432.2 billion — while the number of returns reporting one rose 1.5 percent, so the average per recipient fell from $26,382 to $25,998. Averages fell hardest where they were highest (District of Columbia −6.9 percent) and rose in lower-value states (Iowa +4.9 percent). We can show you the pattern. We cannot tell you what caused it, and no published IRS file can, because none of them marks a distribution as required.

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On this page

• The Same Money, More Hands
• Where the Averages Are Converging
• The Spread Is Still Wide
• Why We Cannot Tell You What Caused This
• Retirement Income Grew, AGI Grew Faster
• What Landed and What Has Not
• Frequently Asked Questions

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The Same Money, More Hands

Three numbers carry the whole story.

The third number is arithmetic, not a finding: divide a constant by a larger denominator and it shrinks. What makes it interesting is that the denominator moved at all while the numerator did not.

Put it against the recent series and the flatness stands out more, not less:

Tax year	Total taxable IRA distributions	Returns reporting one	Average per recipient
2019	$328.3B	15,848,170	$20,716
2020	$282.0B	13,133,280	$21,473
2021	$404.3B	15,655,570	$25,827
2022	$432.1B	16,380,260	$26,382
2023	$432.2B	16,622,430	$25,998

Tax year 2020 is the useful reference point in that table. Total distributions dropped $46 billion and 2.7 million returns dropped out of the count. That year the CARES Act waived required minimum distributions outright, and the waiver is visible in the aggregate without anyone having to squint. It is a demonstration that when a change to the rules is large enough, these files register it.

Nothing of that size shows up in tax year 2023.

Note also what pensions did over the same year, because it runs the other way. Taxable pensions and annuities rose 3.4 percent, from $893.3 billion to $923.5 billion, on slightly fewer returns — 29.8 million down to 29.5 million. Pension income concentrated. IRA income spread out. Two lines on the same tax form, moving in opposite directions.

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Where the Averages Are Converging

The national average hides the more legible pattern, which is geographic. Of the 51 jurisdictions, 31 saw their average taxable IRA distribution fall and 20 saw it rise — and it is not random which did which.

The five largest increases were Iowa (+4.9 percent), Mississippi (+2.5), North Dakota (+1.7), South Dakota (+1.5), and Alaska (+1.5). The five largest declines were the District of Columbia (−6.9 percent), Hawaii (−4.2), California (−3.8), Massachusetts (−3.3), and Florida (−3.1).

The correlation between a jurisdiction's tax year 2022 level and its subsequent change is −0.70. That is a strong relationship for state-level data, and it means the same thing described three ways: the top of the distribution came down, the bottom came up, the spread narrowed.

It is one year. A single year of convergence is not a trend, and a correlation between a level and its own change is the classic setup for regression to the mean — a statistical artifact that can appear even when nothing real is happening underneath. We will know more when tax year 2024 lands, which on current form is roughly two years out.

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The Spread Is Still Wide

Narrower is not narrow. Even after a year of convergence, the gap between the highest and lowest jurisdictions is large.

The District of Columbia averaged $34,604 per recipient. West Virginia averaged $18,840. That is a ratio of about 1.8 to 1 — and it is the ratio of two means, each of which is dragged upward by a small number of very large accounts. SOI publishes no medians for these fields, so the typical DC retiree and the typical West Virginia retiree are both invisible here. What you are comparing is the center of gravity of two dollar totals, not two people.

Reading the top of that list, the obvious guess is that it tracks wealth and account balances. That is a reasonable guess. It is still a guess. Nothing in this file measures balances, and returns are counted where the filer filed, not where the money was earned or where the filer lives most of the year — which matters for Florida, Arizona, and Nevada in particular.

One fact from the tax year 2022 files did not survive the year, and since we have cited it ourselves, it deserves a plain correction here: in tax year 2022, more returns under $25,000 of income reported a taxable IRA distribution than returns over $200,000 (2.71 million versus 2.32 million). In tax year 2023 that reversed — 2.50 million versus 2.61 million, with the over-$200,000 group holding 37.4 percent of the dollars. The convergence described above is part of why. Statements built on the 2022 files remain true of the 2022 files; this is what the new file says.

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Why We Cannot Tell You What Caused This

Here is the part that most write-ups of this data skip, and it is the part that decides whether anything above is worth reading.

Field A01400 is the total of taxable IRA distributions. It does not separate required from voluntary. There is no required-minimum-distribution field in any published IRS Statistics of Income product — not in the geographic files, not anywhere. The single number for each state contains, mixed together and unlabeled:

• Required minimums taken by owners who have reached the age at which they are due
• Entirely voluntary withdrawals by anyone past 59½
• Distributions from inherited IRAs, including everyone working through the 10-year rule
• The taxable portion of Roth conversions
• Early, hardship, and exception-based withdrawals

Form 1099-R, which records the money that actually left the account, has no code meaning required. Its codes describe circumstances. An eighty-year-old's required distribution and a sixty-two-year-old's discretionary withdrawal both carry code 7, "Normal distribution." That is the reason the gap exists, and it is structural rather than an oversight.

So: what would explain a flat total on a rising recipient count?

There are several candidates, and we can name them honestly as long as we are equally clear that this file cannot choose between them.

• Markets. Required minimums are computed from the prior December 31 balance. The 2022 balance that drove tax year 2023 distributions was struck at the bottom of a down year. A smaller balance produces a smaller required amount, mechanically, for every owner subject to one.
• The RMD age moved. SECURE 2.0 raised the starting age from 72 to 73 effective in 2023, which excused one birth cohort from a first distribution that year. That subtracts dollars while leaving voluntary withdrawals untouched.
• More people, smaller accounts. The recipient count can rise because more of the population reached the age, or because more younger holders took something out, or because more beneficiaries opened inherited accounts. Each pushes the average down.
• Roth conversion timing. Conversions land in this field when taxable, and they respond to rate expectations rather than to age.

Every one of those is plausible. Two of them, in combination, would produce exactly the pattern in the chart. None of them can be demonstrated from this file, and anyone who tells you which one it was is inferring rather than reporting. We would rather show you the shape of the thing and say plainly where our evidence stops.

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Retirement Income Grew, AGI Grew Faster

One more result sits slightly to the side of the main story and is easy to misread.

Total retirement income — taxable IRA distributions plus taxable pensions and annuities — rose 2.1 percent per return filed, from $8,352 to $8,525. Over the same year it fell as a share of adjusted gross income, from 9.04 percent to 8.96 percent.

Both are true and they are not in tension. National AGI rose 3.2 percent, from $14.67 trillion to $15.13 trillion, while total returns filed rose only 0.2 percent. Retirement income grew. Everything else grew faster. A falling share here is a statement about the denominator, not about retirees drawing less.

That distinction is the single most common way these files get misreported, and it is why we run both figures rather than one.

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What Landed and What Has Not

The tax year 2023 release came in on the state, county, and metropolitan files. The map at the top of this page is built on the state totals from that release.

ZIP-code data for tax year 2023 has not been released. It is a separate product on a separate date — scheduled for August 27, 2026 — and nothing on this page draws on it. Anything you read claiming ZIP-level tax year 2023 figures before that release is not sourced to the IRS.

Two other things about timing are worth carrying with you. The August 13 date for the state and county files slipped by roughly two weeks; the IRS calls its own release dates tentative and means it. And tax year 2023 returns were filed mostly during 2024, so even the newest file describes a world two to three years back. This is a lagging record, not a current one.

One reassurance on the field itself: the tax year 2018 merge, when IRA distributions were folded into a combined field and the standalone number vanished for a year, has not recurred. A01400 and N01400 are separate fields in the tax year 2023 file, defined exactly as they were in tax year 2022. Tax year 2018 remains the only hole in the series.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Does this mean people are taking smaller required minimum distributions?

It is one candidate explanation and the data cannot confirm it. Field A01400 mixes required distributions with voluntary withdrawals, inherited-account distributions, and the taxable portion of Roth conversions, and no published IRS file separates them. What the file shows is that the total was flat while the recipient count rose 1.5 percent.

Why did averages fall most in the highest states?

We can measure that they did — the correlation between the tax year 2022 level and the change to 2023 is −0.70 — and not why. Regression to the mean alone can produce this pattern in a single year of data. One year is not a trend.

Is $432.2 billion all IRA money that came out in 2023?

No. It is the taxable portion reported on individual returns. Qualified Roth distributions and the untaxed part of any distribution are excluded, and the geographic files also drop returns with negative AGI. The real gross figure is larger.

Is $25,998 what a typical recipient took?

No. It is a mean: total dollars divided by the number of returns reporting a distribution. Retirement balances are heavily skewed, so the mean sits well above the middle of the distribution. SOI publishes no medians for these fields.

Where is the ZIP-code data for tax year 2023?

Not yet released as of this writing. State, county, and metropolitan files came out in late August 2026; ZIP-code data is a separate release scheduled for August 27, 2026, and had not been posted when this article published; when the ZIP files land, our what-changed analysis follows within 48 hours.

Does any of this affect what I have to withdraw?

No. Your required minimum is your prior year-end balance divided by a factor from the IRS tables — see how to calculate an RMD. No state average is an input to it.

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The aggregate is context. Your number is a calculation.

• How to calculate an RMD — the arithmetic, with the table that applies to you.
• What these files can and cannot show → · The full data write-up →
• What an RMD costs you in tax → · Inherited IRA rules →
• Terms defined in the glossary → · Source documents →

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This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute tax, legal, or financial advice. Aggregate geographic statistics describe populations, not individuals, and have no bearing on any particular taxpayer's required minimum distribution. IRS rules and tax laws are subject to change. Consult a qualified tax professional or financial advisor for guidance specific to your situation. SimpleRMD is a calculation and tracking tool — not a financial advisory service.

Sources: IRS Statistics of Income — County Data and Data by geographic area; Upcoming data releases. All figures computed by us from the published tax year 2015 through 2023 county files (state-total rows), fields N01400, A01400, N01700, A01700, N1, and A00100. Dollar amounts in those files are stated in thousands and are converted here. Field definitions read from the SOI documentation guides for tax years 2017 through 2023; the tax year 2023 guide repeats the tax year 2022 definitions and contains no combined IRA-and-pension field. Distribution factors: IRS Publication 590-B, Appendix B. Distribution codes read from Form 1099-R. Data retrieved August 2026; tax year 2023 was the most recent state and county release at publication, and tax year 2023 ZIP-code data had not been released.