Most take-home calculators — including this site's — give you a federal number and a state number and stop.
In twelve states that is not the whole bill. A city, county, school district or transit authority can levy its own income tax on top, and in several of them it is large enough to change which state is cheaper.
Philadelphia's resident wage tax is 3.735%. On an $85,000 salary that is $3,175 a year — more than the entire state income tax bill in 26 states.
A note before you start. This is general education, not tax advice. Local rates come from this site's own sourced fifty-state dataset and are current as recorded; they change by ordinance and by jurisdiction, so check your own before relying on any figure here. State take-home figures are computed by this site's engine for tax year 2026 on a single filer taking the standard deduction, using federal figures from IRS Revenue Procedure 2025-32. No local tax is included in any take-home figure on this site.
1. The twelve
| State | Who levies it | Typical rates recorded |
|---|---|---|
| Alabama | ~2 dozen cities, occupational licence tax | Birmingham 1%, Gadsden 2% |
| Delaware | Wilmington only | 1.25% |
| Indiana | All 92 counties | 0.50% to 3.00% |
| Iowa | School districts, some counties | % of state tax owed |
| Kentucky | Most cities and counties | Louisville 2.2%, Lexington 2.25% |
| Maryland | Every county + Baltimore City | 2.25% to 3.30% |
| Michigan | 24 cities | Detroit 2.4%, Grand Rapids 1.5% |
| Missouri | Kansas City, St. Louis | 1% earnings tax |
| New York | New York City and Yonkers only | NYC 3.078% to 3.876% |
| Ohio | Several hundred municipalities | Cleveland 2.5%, Barberton 2.25% |
| Oregon | Portland metro districts | 1% to 3% above thresholds |
| Pennsylvania | Most municipalities + school districts | Philadelphia 3.735%, typical EIT 1% |
The other thirty-eight states have none anywhere. In several the prohibition is express rather than incidental — Washington's was litigated when Seattle tried, and Wyoming, Nevada and Florida preempt it by statute or constitution.
See your state take-home, then add your own local rate2. Two states where it is universal
In ten of the twelve, whether you pay depends on where you live or work. In two, everyone pays.
Indiana — all 92 counties
Every Indiana county levies a local income tax, at rates running from 0.50% in Porter County to 3.00% in Randolph County.
The top county rate now exceeds the state rate. Indiana's flat state rate is 2.95%; Randolph County's 3.00% is higher. For a resident there the local tax is the larger of the two lines.
The rule that decides which rate applies is county of residence on 1 January — not where you work, and not where you live in December. Both the county of residence and the county of principal employment are fixed on 1 January of the year in which the tax year begins, which means a move in February does not change that year's rate.
Maryland — every county and Baltimore City
Ignoring Maryland's local tax misstates a Maryland bill by roughly a third.
The 2026 range is 2.25% in Worcester County to 3.30% in Dorchester and Kent, against a statutory maximum of 3.30% that took effect for tax years beginning after 31 December 2025.
Two counties changed for 2026: Allegany rose from 3.03% to 3.20%, and Kent from 3.20% to 3.30%.
And two counties cannot be described with a single rate at all. Anne Arundel and Frederick both use bracketed local rates, so a flat figure would be false for them — which is why this site's dataset omits them from its rate list rather than averaging them into something tidy and wrong.
3. Two states where almost nobody pays
New York. Only New York City and Yonkers levy one. A resident of Buffalo, Albany, Rochester, Syracuse or anywhere on Long Island outside the city adds nothing at all.
New York City's is a separate graduated personal income tax reported on the same Form IT-201, running 3.078% / 3.762% / 3.819% / 3.876%. The top bracket is reached at just $50,000 of city taxable income for a single filer, so essentially every full-time city worker is paying close to the full 3.876% at the margin.
Yonkers levies a surcharge on residents and a 0.5% earnings tax on non-residents who work there.
Delaware. Wilmington is the only municipality in the state that levies one, at 1.25% — and it applies to anyone who lives or works in the city.
It is an earned income tax. It reaches salaries, wages, commissions, bonuses and net business profits, and does not reach interest, dividends, capital gains, pensions or Social Security. So a Wilmington retiree living on investment and pension income pays none of it, while a Wilmington wage earner pays it on every dollar with no exemption threshold.
4. Iowa's works completely differently
Every other state on this list taxes a percentage of income. Iowa taxes a percentage of your state tax.
Form IA 1040 line 19 is "School district surtax or EMS surtax: multiply line 18 by the percentage from list." Line 18 is your Iowa tax. The surtax rides on the tax, not on the income.
Two separate levies use that line: a school district income surtax, set independently by each Iowa school district, and an emergency medical services surtax adopted by some counties.
The practical consequence is that you cannot convert an Iowa surtax to an effective rate on income without knowing your Iowa tax first. A 10% school district surtax on an Iowa bill of $2,578 is $258 — not 10% of your salary, which is the mistake the phrasing invites.
It also means the surtax is progressive by construction: it scales with your state liability, which already scales with income.
5. Oregon's are the heaviest, and most people pay none of them
Oregon is the outlier in shape rather than in rate. Its local income taxes are confined to the Portland metro area, they carry exemption thresholds nothing else on this list has, and above those thresholds they are among the heaviest local income taxes in the country.
Two separate levies, on overlapping geography:
Metro Supportive Housing Services (SHS) — 1% on taxable income above an exemption threshold, across the Metro district covering parts of Multnomah, Washington and Clackamas counties. For 2026 the thresholds are $128,000 single and $205,000 joint, up from $125,000 and $200,000 for 2021–2025, and from 2026 forward they are adjusted annually for inflation.
Multnomah County Preschool for All (PFA) — 1.5% on income above $125,000 single / $200,000 joint, plus a further 1.5% above a higher threshold, so the top marginal county rate reaches 3%.
A Multnomah County resident above both thresholds is inside both taxes at once.
Two consequences that pull in opposite directions:
Most Portland workers pay nothing. A threshold of $125,000 or $128,000 for a single filer puts the great majority of wage earners entirely outside both levies. Unlike Maryland or Indiana, where everyone pays from the first dollar, Oregon's local taxes are invisible to most of the people living in their footprint.
And for those above the line, the marginal cost is severe. Oregon already has the highest state income tax bill of any state at $85,000 — $6,864. Adding 1% Metro plus up to 3% Multnomah on income above the thresholds gives a Portland high earner a combined state-and-local marginal rate that is among the steepest in the United States.
The threshold structure also produces a sharp step. Because the levies apply to income above the threshold rather than to all income once you cross it, there is no cliff — crossing $128,000 does not retroactively tax the first $128,000. But the marginal rate on the next dollar jumps by up to four percentage points, which is a real planning consideration for anyone near the line, and the point at which a pre-tax deferral becomes unusually valuable.
6. What it actually costs
For the jurisdictions whose tax is levied on gross earned income, the arithmetic is direct. On an $85,000 salary:
| Jurisdiction | Rate | Annual | Monthly |
|---|---|---|---|
| Philadelphia (resident) | 3.735% | $3,175 | $265 |
| Cleveland | 2.5% | $2,125 | $177 |
| Detroit (resident) | 2.4% | $2,040 | $170 |
| Louisville (resident) | 2.2% | $1,870 | $156 |
| Wilmington | 1.25% | $1,063 | $89 |
| Birmingham | 1% | $850 | $71 |
| Kansas City | 1% | $850 | $71 |
Philadelphia's $3,175 is the number to sit with.
Pennsylvania's own state income tax on $85,000 is $2,610. The city charges more than the state does.
And $3,175 exceeds the entire state income tax bill at that salary in twenty-six states — every no-income-tax state, plus North Dakota, Ohio, Arizona, Louisiana, Indiana, Rhode Island, Iowa, Pennsylvania itself, Mississippi, Arkansas, New Mexico, Kentucky, North Carolina, Nebraska, West Virginia, Colorado and Missouri.
A Philadelphia resident earning $85,000 pays $5,785 in combined state and city income tax — within $1,079 of Oregon, the highest-taxing state in the country, in a state whose headline rate is the fourth-lowest flat rate there is.
For Maryland, Indiana, New York, Oregon and Iowa the base is a taxable-income figure rather than gross wages, so the same multiplication does not apply — the rate is real but the base is smaller and defined differently in each. Use your own return, not a percentage of salary.
7. Working in one place and living in another
This is where local income tax gets genuinely difficult, and it is the part most people discover after the fact.
Many of these taxes reach non-residents who work in the jurisdiction. Moving to a suburb does not escape them if the job stays put.
Alabama's occupational licence taxes apply based on where the work is performed, not where the worker lives — residents and non-residents alike.
Delaware's Wilmington tax applies to anyone who lives or works in the city.
Michigan and Kentucky charge non-residents at a lower rate than residents. Detroit is 2.4% resident, 1.2% non-resident. Louisville is 2.2% resident, 1.45% non-resident.
Philadelphia charges 3.735% to residents and 3.425% to non-residents working in the city — a much smaller discount than Detroit's.
Missouri's Kansas City and St. Louis earnings taxes reach non-residents for work performed in the city. That matters especially at Kansas City, where HUD prices the Missouri and Kansas sides of the metro identically, so the earnings tax is one of the few things that actually differs — and it follows your workplace, not your address.
Ohio's system adds a further wrinkle: where you live and where you work both levy, and your home municipality may give a credit for tax paid to the other — sometimes full, sometimes partial, sometimes none. Look up both, and look up the credit.
8. Why no calculator includes this
Three reasons, and they are all honest ones.
The rates are set jurisdiction by jurisdiction. Ohio alone has several hundred municipalities levying one, Pennsylvania has thousands of taxing bodies between municipalities and school districts, and Iowa's varies by school district. A national dataset of every rate would be enormous and stale the day it shipped.
The bases differ. Some are on gross wages, some on state taxable income, one on state tax owed. A single "local rate" field would be false for most of them.
And the residency and credit rules are jurisdiction-specific. Whether you owe depends on where you live on a particular date, where you work, and what credit your home jurisdiction gives — none of which a salary-and-state calculator knows.
So this site names the twelve states, records representative rates with citations, and states plainly that no total on the site includes them. That is the honest posture. The alternative — quietly picking one rate per state — would make the figures look complete and be wrong for almost everyone.
9. What to do about it
If you live or work in one of the twelve, look up two things.
Your rate, from the jurisdiction itself — a city finance department, a county auditor, the state revenue department's local tax list. Not from a summary, including this one, because rates change by ordinance.
And the credit rules, if you live and work in different taxing jurisdictions. This is where the money is and it is the part summaries skip.
Then add it to whatever take-home figure you started with. On $85,000, a 2% local rate is roughly $142 a month off a number that looked final.
Three quick sanity checks:
In Indiana and Maryland, assume you pay. There is no jurisdiction in either state without one.
In New York, assume you do not — unless you are in New York City or Yonkers.
In Pennsylvania and Ohio, assume you pay something, because most jurisdictions levy, and check whether it is one levy or two.
Frequently asked questions
Which states have local income taxes? Twelve: Alabama, Delaware, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, Missouri, New York, Ohio, Oregon and Pennsylvania. The other thirty-eight have none anywhere, and several prohibit them expressly.
Where is local income tax unavoidable? Indiana and Maryland. All 92 Indiana counties levy one, and so does every Maryland county plus Baltimore City. In both states there is nowhere to live that avoids it.
How much does Philadelphia's wage tax cost? 3.735% for residents — $3,175 a year on an $85,000 salary, which is more than Pennsylvania's own state income tax of $2,610 at that salary, and more than the entire state income tax bill in twenty-six states. Non-residents working in the city pay 3.425%.
Does everyone in New York State pay a local income tax? No. Only New York City and Yonkers levy one. Everywhere else in the state adds nothing.
Why is Iowa's local tax different? Because it is levied as a percentage of your state tax owed rather than of your income. A 10% school district surtax applies to your Iowa tax figure, not to your salary — which is a much smaller number.
Can I avoid a local income tax by moving to a suburb? Often not. Many of these taxes reach non-residents who work in the jurisdiction — Alabama's occupational taxes, Wilmington's, Philadelphia's, Detroit's, Louisville's, and the Kansas City and St. Louis earnings taxes all do, though several charge non-residents a lower rate.
Are local taxes included in this site's take-home figures? No, and this article exists to say so. Rates are set jurisdiction by jurisdiction, the bases differ, and the residency and credit rules are local — so this site names the states and cites representative rates rather than quietly guessing one per state.
Do I pay Portland's local income taxes? Only above the thresholds. The Metro Supportive Housing Services tax is 1% on taxable income above $128,000 single or $205,000 joint for 2026, and Multnomah County's Preschool for All tax is 1.5% above $125,000 single with a further 1.5% above a higher threshold. Below those figures a Portland worker pays neither, which is why most people in their footprint never encounter them.
Does Indiana's local tax really exceed its state tax? In the highest county, yes. Indiana's flat state rate is 2.95% and Randolph County's local rate is 3.00%. The range across the 92 counties starts at 0.50% in Porter County.
What to do next
Twelve states, two where everyone pays, and a Philadelphia line item bigger than most states' entire income tax.
- Take-home pay calculator — the state figure, before your local rate.
- What the nine no-income-tax states charge instead — and why none of them permits a local one.
- Pre-tax deferrals and your paycheck — the lever that works in all fifty states.
- Your paycheck in the USA in 2026 — all fifty states.
Every figure on this site is sourced and dated. How we source every number.
Local income tax rates come from this site's own sourced fifty-state dataset, recorded per state with citations to the levying authority or state revenue department; they are representative rather than exhaustive and change by ordinance, so verify your own before relying on any figure here. Maryland's 2026 county rates are the Comptroller's published rates, not withholding-table approximations; Anne Arundel and Frederick use bracketed local rates and are deliberately excluded from the flat-rate list. State take-home figures are computed by this site's own tax engine for tax year 2026 on a single filer taking the standard deduction with no dependents or pre-tax deferrals, using federal figures from IRS Revenue Procedure 2025-32. NO local tax is included in any take-home total on this site. This is general education and not tax advice.