Payroll Tax Calculator

About this calculator

FICA payroll taxes in the US consist of two parts: Social Security tax, generally 6.2% withheld from the employee plus a matching 6.2% paid by the employer (up to an annual wage base cap that is indexed each year), and Medicare tax, generally 1.45% from the employee matched by 1.45% from the employer, with no wage cap — plus an extra Medicare surtax that applies only to the employee above a high earnings threshold.

Because both the employee and employer portions are calculated from the same gross pay, this calculator applies the Social Security and Medicare rates you enter to a gross pay amount and shows the tax owed by the employee and by the employer side by side — useful for payroll estimates, understanding a pay stub, or budgeting the true cost of an employee.