U.S. Federal Withholding on Paychecks

[Allanon]

Wow, I'd kill for your tax rates...

Lowest tax box in the Netherlands is 37,5%, the next one around 47% and the last one above 50%. And above that you have Social Health insurance, Pension deducntions, etc., etc. In the end people like me can deliver more than 40% of their income directly to the state

[I know I'm comparing apples with oranges here but I love complaining about taxes ]

 

[diaglo]

The Federal Income Tax witheld from my last paycheck was 8.6%. The more you make, the more you're taxed.

last was 9.25%. and i still owe at the end of the year. with no exemptions.

marriage penalty

heck every 3 months i'm sending in $492 extra estimated tax...

 

[Queen_Dopplepopolis]

I've been using direct deposit for the last 12 years and have never had a problem with it not showing up.

My husband uses direct deposit... if anything, his check ends up in the bank EARLY. (ie - this pay period, his check was in the bank on midnight the 14th). So nice.

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

My husband uses direct deposit... if anything, his check ends up in the bank EARLY. (ie - this pay period, his check was in the bank on midnight the 14th). So nice.

I had one incident with direct deposit: My wife and I were about to sign P&S for our house and had the down payment sitting in our checking account. The day I went to get the cashier's check, I discovered I was about $1500 short. Turns out a company I had worked for a year prior to this changed payroll companies and gave them the wrong information. The new payroll company somehow thought I was still on payroll and deposited a paycheck into my account, noticed the mistake and withdrew the money - unfortunately they withdrew the amount twice. It sucked only because we needed the money that day. The company corrected the error, but it took a couple of days to do so, and I ended up getting my parents to float me the missing $1500 until it was corrected so we could make the down payment .

With all that I still use direct deposit because it is much more convenient, but I do keep a pretty close eye on my account.

 

[Storminator]

Actually.....

You end up paying around 15% of your pay in Social Security & Medicare. Ask anyone who is self employed how much the government yanks out of their checks.

The goverment just came up with this cool idea of saying your employer pays 7% & you pay 7%. Common sense would tell you that what that REALLY means is that you pay 15% for SS & MC, just that the government takes 7% before you ever see it.

But, no. Your employer is just helping pay YOUR taxes for you. I mean, if people thought the government was yanking 15% before any REAL taxes were applied.....

PS. Start saving for retirement now. Expect to see NOTHING from Social Security. If its there, bonus. If its not, your not screwed. Start now & you'll be amazed how just 5 bucks a week will grow in 10 to 15 years.

I think it's reasonable to assume that if that 7+% wasn't being paid by your employer, your pay would increase by less than 7%. In other words, the tax affects your wages some, and your employers profit some as well. Where the split would be is relatively impossible to determine, but it's somewhere in the middle.

And by all means save for retirement. And buy a house.

PS