United States salary calculator 2026

There is no single American payslip. Federal income tax and the FICA contributions are the same from Maine to Hawaii, but on top of them sit state income tax, sometimes city income tax, and whatever the employee has chosen to route through payroll for health insurance and retirement savings. Two people on identical salaries in Texas and California take home noticeably different amounts. Our model computes the federal layer only, which is the part that is common to everyone, and that is why the United States is marked as an estimate.

Federal income tax: seven brackets and a standard deduction

The model treats the employee as a single filer taking the standard deduction of 16,100 US dollars a year. After that deduction, taxable income is run through seven brackets: 10% on the first 12,400 dollars, 12% up to 50,400, 22% up to 105,700, 24% up to 201,775, 32% up to 256,225, 35% up to 640,600 and 37% above. Brackets are marginal, so moving into a higher one only changes the rate on the dollars above the line. Filing status matters a great deal in the US system; married couples filing jointly get wider brackets and a larger deduction, and the calculator does not model that.

FICA: Social Security and Medicare

The employee contributions are the two halves of FICA. Social Security takes 6.2% of gross and funds retirement, disability and survivor benefits; Medicare takes 1.45% and funds hospital insurance for the over-65s. Together they are 7.65%, and unlike in many European systems they do not reduce the income tax base: federal tax is calculated on gross pay, not on pay after FICA. Two real-world details are left out of the model. Social Security stops being charged above an annual wage cap, and an additional Medicare surtax applies to high earners. Neither touches the salaries in the table below.

Three example salaries

The first row is the federal minimum wage converted to a monthly figure, and it shows something distinctive about the US: a full-time minimum-wage worker pays no federal income tax at all, because the standard deduction is larger than the annual salary, yet still loses 7.65% to FICA. Many states set a higher minimum, so this row is a floor rather than a typical low wage. At the average salary federal tax and FICA are roughly equal. Even at 8,000 dollars a month the federal effective rate stays around a fifth of gross, which looks gentle next to Europe until state tax and health premiums are added.

The employer's matching share

The employer matches FICA dollar for dollar: another 7.65% on top of gross. On the 5,174 dollar average wage that is about 396 dollars a month and a total cost of roughly 5,570 dollars. This is one of the lowest statutory employer burdens in this dataset, but it understates the real cost of an American hire, because employer-sponsored health insurance and federal and state unemployment taxes are paid on top, and the model does not attempt to estimate them.

No VAT

The United States has no VAT or national sales tax; instead, states and sometimes cities levy their own sales taxes at the point of purchase, which is why a price tag in an American shop is not the amount charged at the till. For that reason there is no US VAT calculator on this site. The VAT guide explains how the European system differs from a retail sales tax.

Working time and federal holidays

The standard week is 40 hours over five 8 hour days. Federal law does not cap weekly hours; what it does is require overtime pay for non-exempt employees beyond 40 hours, which is why the model shows 40 as both the standard and the maximum. The 2026 calendar includes New Year's Day, Juneteenth on 19 June, Independence Day on 4 July, Veterans Day on 11 November and Christmas Day. Independence Day is a Saturday in 2026, so 4 of the 5 land on weekdays and the model counts 257 working days. The full federal list also has Martin Luther King Day, Presidents' Day, Memorial Day, Labor Day, Columbus Day and Thanksgiving, and private employers are not legally required to give any of them as paid days off. The working days calculator uses the model's shorter list.

What the estimate leaves out

The federal brackets, the standard deduction and the FICA rates are exact for a single filer. Everything state-specific is absent: state and local income tax, state disability insurance in the handful of states that charge it, and the state minimum wage. Pre-tax 401(k) contributions and health premiums, which lower federal taxable income, are also outside the model. Treat the net figure as the ceiling on take-home pay rather than the expected amount, and read why your payslip differs before relying on it. For a cross-border comparison, Canada is modelled the same way, federal layer only, so the two are at least like for like.