﻿<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<InstanceReport xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema">
  <Version>2.2.0.7</Version>
  <hasSegments>false</hasSegments>
  <ReportName>INCOME TAXES</ReportName>
  <ReportLongName>1150 - Disclosure - INCOME TAXES</ReportLongName>
  <DisplayLabelColumn>true</DisplayLabelColumn>
  <ShowElementNames>false</ShowElementNames>
  <RoundingOption />
  <HasEmbeddedReports>false</HasEmbeddedReports>
  <Columns>
    <Column>
      <LabelColumn>false</LabelColumn>
      <Id>1</Id>
      <Labels>
        <Label Id="1" Label="9 Months Ended" />
        <Label Id="2" Label="Sep. 30, 2010" />
      </Labels>
      <CurrencyCode>USD</CurrencyCode>
      <FootnoteIndexer />
      <hasSegments>false</hasSegments>
      <hasScenarios>false</hasScenarios>
      <Segments />
      <Scenarios />
      <Units>
        <Unit>
          <UnitID>USD</UnitID>
          <UnitType>Standard</UnitType>
          <StandardMeasure>
            <MeasureSchema>http://www.xbrl.org/2003/iso4217</MeasureSchema>
            <MeasureValue>USD</MeasureValue>
            <MeasureNamespace>iso4217</MeasureNamespace>
          </StandardMeasure>
          <Scale>0</Scale>
        </Unit>
        <Unit>
          <UnitID>USDPerShare</UnitID>
          <UnitType>Divide</UnitType>
          <NumeratorMeasure>
            <MeasureSchema>http://www.xbrl.org/2003/iso4217</MeasureSchema>
            <MeasureValue>USD</MeasureValue>
            <MeasureNamespace>iso4217</MeasureNamespace>
          </NumeratorMeasure>
          <DenominatorMeasure>
            <MeasureSchema>http://www.xbrl.org/2003/instance</MeasureSchema>
            <MeasureValue>shares</MeasureValue>
            <MeasureNamespace>xbrli</MeasureNamespace>
          </DenominatorMeasure>
          <Scale>0</Scale>
        </Unit>
        <Unit>
          <UnitID>Shares</UnitID>
          <UnitType>Standard</UnitType>
          <StandardMeasure>
            <MeasureSchema>http://www.xbrl.org/2003/instance</MeasureSchema>
            <MeasureValue>shares</MeasureValue>
            <MeasureNamespace>xbrli</MeasureNamespace>
          </StandardMeasure>
          <Scale>0</Scale>
        </Unit>
      </Units>
      <CurrencySymbol>$</CurrencySymbol>
    </Column>
  </Columns>
  <Rows>
    <Row>
      <Id>2</Id>
      <Label>INCOME TAXES</Label>
      <Level>0</Level>
      <ElementName>ceph_IncomeTaxesDisclosureAbstract</ElementName>
      <ElementPrefix>ceph</ElementPrefix>
      <IsBaseElement>false</IsBaseElement>
      <BalanceType>na</BalanceType>
      <PeriodType>duration</PeriodType>
      <ShortDefinition>No definition available.</ShortDefinition>
      <IsReportTitle>false</IsReportTitle>
      <IsSegmentTitle>false</IsSegmentTitle>
      <IsSubReportEnd>false</IsSubReportEnd>
      <IsCalendarTitle>false</IsCalendarTitle>
      <IsTuple>false</IsTuple>
      <IsAbstractGroupTitle>true</IsAbstractGroupTitle>
      <IsEquityPrevioslyReportedAsRow>false</IsEquityPrevioslyReportedAsRow>
      <IsEquityAdjustmentRow>false</IsEquityAdjustmentRow>
      <IsBeginningBalance>false</IsBeginningBalance>
      <IsEndingBalance>false</IsEndingBalance>
      <IsReverseSign>false</IsReverseSign>
      <PreferredLabelRole />
      <IsEPS>false</IsEPS>
      <FootnoteIndexer />
      <Cells>
        <Cell>
          <Id>1</Id>
          <ShowCurrencySymbol>false</ShowCurrencySymbol>
          <IsNumeric>false</IsNumeric>
          <IsRatio>false</IsRatio>
          <DisplayZeroAsNone>false</DisplayZeroAsNone>
          <NumericAmount>0</NumericAmount>
          <RoundedNumericAmount>0</RoundedNumericAmount>
          <NonNumbericText />
          <NonNumericTextHeader />
          <FootnoteIndexer />
          <hasSegments>false</hasSegments>
          <hasScenarios>false</hasScenarios>
          <DisplayDateInUSFormat>false</DisplayDateInUSFormat>
        </Cell>
      </Cells>
      <OriginalInstanceReportColumns />
      <ElementDataType>xbrli:stringItemType</ElementDataType>
      <SimpleDataType>string</SimpleDataType>
      <ElementDefenition>No definition available.</ElementDefenition>
      <IsTotalLabel>false</IsTotalLabel>
    </Row>
    <Row>
      <Id>3</Id>
      <Label>INCOME TAXES</Label>
      <Level>1</Level>
      <ElementName>us-gaap_IncomeTaxDisclosureTextBlock</ElementName>
      <ElementPrefix>us-gaap</ElementPrefix>
      <IsBaseElement>true</IsBaseElement>
      <BalanceType>na</BalanceType>
      <PeriodType>duration</PeriodType>
      <ShortDefinition>No definition available.</ShortDefinition>
      <IsReportTitle>false</IsReportTitle>
      <IsSegmentTitle>false</IsSegmentTitle>
      <IsSubReportEnd>false</IsSubReportEnd>
      <IsCalendarTitle>false</IsCalendarTitle>
      <IsTuple>false</IsTuple>
      <IsAbstractGroupTitle>false</IsAbstractGroupTitle>
      <IsEquityPrevioslyReportedAsRow>false</IsEquityPrevioslyReportedAsRow>
      <IsEquityAdjustmentRow>false</IsEquityAdjustmentRow>
      <IsBeginningBalance>false</IsBeginningBalance>
      <IsEndingBalance>false</IsEndingBalance>
      <IsReverseSign>false</IsReverseSign>
      <PreferredLabelRole>terselabel</PreferredLabelRole>
      <IsEPS>false</IsEPS>
      <FootnoteIndexer />
      <Cells>
        <Cell>
          <Id>1</Id>
          <ShowCurrencySymbol>false</ShowCurrencySymbol>
          <IsNumeric>false</IsNumeric>
          <IsRatio>false</IsRatio>
          <DisplayZeroAsNone>false</DisplayZeroAsNone>
          <NumericAmount>0</NumericAmount>
          <RoundedNumericAmount>0</RoundedNumericAmount>
          <NonNumbericText>&lt;table style="font-size:10pt; font-family:'Times New Roman',times,serif;"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;
&lt;p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"&gt;&lt;b&gt;&lt;font style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold; FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Times New Roman" size="2"&gt;15.&amp;nbsp; INCOME TAXES&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/b&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt; TEXT-INDENT: 0.5in"&gt;&lt;font style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Times New Roman" size="2"&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt; TEXT-INDENT: 0.5in"&gt;&lt;font style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Times New Roman" size="2"&gt;For the three months ended September&amp;nbsp;30, 2010, we recognized $61.3 million of income tax expense on income before income taxes of $192.8 million, resulting in an overall effective tax rate of&amp;nbsp; 31.8 percent.&amp;nbsp; For the nine months ended September&amp;nbsp;30, 2010, we recognized $172.8 million of income tax expense on income before income taxes of $497.1 million, resulting in an overall effective tax rate of 34.8 percent.&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt; TEXT-INDENT: 0.5in"&gt;&lt;font style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Times New Roman" size="2"&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt; TEXT-INDENT: 0.5in"&gt;&lt;font style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Times New Roman" size="2"&gt;The Internal Revenue Service (&amp;#147;IRS&amp;#148;) currently is examining Cephalon,&amp;nbsp;Inc.&amp;#146;s 2006 and 2007 U.S. federal income tax returns.&amp;nbsp; In other significant foreign jurisdictions, the tax years that remains open for potential examination range from 2001 to 2009.&amp;nbsp; We do not believe at this time that the results of these examinations will have a material impact on our financial statements.&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt; TEXT-INDENT: 0.5in"&gt;&lt;font style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Times New Roman" size="2"&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt; TEXT-INDENT: 0.5in"&gt;&lt;font style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Times New Roman" size="2"&gt;In the regular course of business, various state and local tax authorities also conduct examinations of our state and local income tax returns.&amp;nbsp; Depending on the state, state income tax returns are generally subject to examination for a period of three to five years after filing.&amp;nbsp; &lt;/font&gt;&lt;font style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt" size="2"&gt;The state impact of any federal changes that may result from the 2006 and 2007 IRS examination and the agreed to federal changes from the 2003 to 2005 IRS examination, settled in 2008, remain subject to examination by various states for a period of up to one year after formal notification to the states. We currently have several state income tax returns in the process of examination.&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt; TEXT-INDENT: 0.5in"&gt;&lt;font style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Times New Roman" size="2"&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt; TEXT-INDENT: 0.5in"&gt;&lt;font style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Times New Roman" size="2"&gt;In 2010, we received $16.0 million in federal tax refunds of previously paid federal taxes.&amp;nbsp; This refund was due to the carryback of unused federal tax credits from the tax year ending December&amp;nbsp;31, 2008. I&lt;/font&gt;&lt;font style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt" size="2"&gt;n 2009, we received $67.3&amp;nbsp;million in federal tax refunds of previously paid federal taxes. This refund was principally due to the tax benefit relating to the termination of our collaboration with Alkermes and the settlement with the USAO.&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;&lt;/table&gt;
</NonNumbericText>
          <NonNumericTextHeader>15.&amp;nbsp; INCOME TAXES
&amp;nbsp;
For the three months ended September&amp;nbsp;30, 2010, we recognized $61.3 million of income tax expense on income before income</NonNumericTextHeader>
          <FootnoteIndexer />
          <hasSegments>false</hasSegments>
          <hasScenarios>false</hasScenarios>
          <DisplayDateInUSFormat>false</DisplayDateInUSFormat>
        </Cell>
      </Cells>
      <OriginalInstanceReportColumns />
      <ElementDataType>us-types:textBlockItemType</ElementDataType>
      <SimpleDataType>textblock</SimpleDataType>
      <ElementDefenition>Description containing the entire income tax disclosure. Examples include net deferred tax liability or asset recognized in an enterprise's statement of financial position, net change during the year in the total valuation allowance, approximate tax effect of each type of temporary difference and carryforward that gives rise to a significant portion of deferred tax liabilities and deferred tax assets, utilization of a tax carryback, and tax uncertainties information. This element may be used as a single block of text to encapsulate the entire disclosure including data and tables.</ElementDefenition>
      <ElementReferences>Reference 1: http://www.xbrl.org/2003/role/presentationRef
 -Publisher SEC
 -Name Regulation S-X (SX)
 -Number 210
 -Section 08
 -Paragraph h
 -Article 4

Reference 2: http://www.xbrl.org/2003/role/presentationRef
 -Publisher FASB
 -Name Statement of Financial Accounting Standard (FAS)
 -Number 109
 -Paragraph 136, 172

Reference 3: http://www.xbrl.org/2003/role/presentationRef
 -Publisher FASB
 -Name Statement of Financial Accounting Standard (FAS)
 -Number 109
 -Paragraph 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49

</ElementReferences>
      <IsTotalLabel>false</IsTotalLabel>
    </Row>
  </Rows>
  <Footnotes />
  <NumberOfCols>1</NumberOfCols>
  <NumberOfRows>2</NumberOfRows>
  <HasScenarios>false</HasScenarios>
  <MonetaryRoundingLevel>UnKnown</MonetaryRoundingLevel>
  <SharesRoundingLevel>UnKnown</SharesRoundingLevel>
  <PerShareRoundingLevel>UnKnown</PerShareRoundingLevel>
  <HasPureData>false</HasPureData>
  <SharesShouldBeRounded>true</SharesShouldBeRounded>
</InstanceReport>
