The Internal Revenue Service has found that the number of partnership returns increased 5 percent between tax years 2006 and 2007, from more than 2.9 million to over 3 million.

The number of partners also increased 11 percent, from 16.7 million for 2006 to 18.5 million for 2007. Total partnership net income (loss) increased by 3 percent, from $666.7 billion for 2006 to $683.4 billion for 2007.

California, Florida, New York and Texas, with a combined 33 percent of the nation’s population, together filed 32 percent of all partnership returns for tax year 2007. While Texas and New York together account for 14 percent of the nation’s population, the two states — Texas with gross receipts of $783.8 billion and New York with gross receipts of $700.1 billion — accounted for 35 percent of partnership gross receipts in the United States. California, Florida, New York and Texas also accounted for 35 percent of all sole proprietorship returns filed for 2007.

More information can be found in the IRS’s Fall 2009 issue of the Statistics of Income Bulletin.