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What's with telling YEARLY salaries? (lemmy.zip)
submitted 3 years ago by to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml
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I think this is mostly a US thing. Why use yearly salary? You're not paid once a year, are you? Most likely once a month. Referencing monthly salary makes much more sense.

"I'm making 50k". Great, now I have to guess - dollars? Monthly? Yearly? If yearly then what's the monthly paycheck? Net? Gross?

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[+] -7 points 3 years ago (8 children)

You wrote "it determines your tax bracket" inferring you'd be in a single bracket and this is an extremely common misconception with how our tax system works. Furthermore, your income is only part of the equation since your tax rate is also affected by deductions, exemptions, and credits making two people making the exact same income can be taxed at different rates.

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  • [–] 9 points 3 years ago (5 children)

    For future reference. Anytime people are talking about "their tax bracket" in a progressive tax system, they are talking about the top level bracket.

    It's typically redundant to, mid conversation, list all the tax brackets that exist under the one you're talking about.

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  • [–] -3 points 3 years ago (4 children)

    The only people I've ever heard talking about "their tax bracket" are the types who refuse to take an extra hours at work because "it'll put me in a higher tax bracket and I'll actually earn less money than if I hadn't worked it at all" even though that's mathematically impossible.

    Someone earning $44,726 will put them a whole dollar into the 22% tax bracket meaning they pay $0.22 more in taxes than if they'd stayed within the 12% bracket of $11,001-$44,725. Claiming "I'm in the 22% bracket" is completely meaningless, as evidenced with the above example, and ignores the fact that this person is much more likely to have an effective tax rate of around 12% or less. If you're only paying 12% of your income in taxes, why in the world would you say you're "in the 22% bracket?"

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  • [–] 4 points 3 years ago (3 children)

    Naw dude... I know how tax brackets work.

    Most folks who know how taxes work refer to their "tax bracket" inclusively with respect to both the point they are at as well as inclusive with all below

    Because its impossible to be at the third tax bracket without logically also being in the first and second implicitly, it is redundant to include that.

    Sorry mate but you are just coming across as pedantic here, or uninformed. Its quite normal to, colloquially, refer to the topmost bracket you are encroached into as "your tax bracket" singular, with everyone in the room understanding that is inclusive with all those below it.

    I wont deny that there are a lot of people that think that going up a tax bracket means all their income is taxed at the new rate, which is always hilarious that people still think that in 2023.

    But no, I assure you, I know how progressive tax brackets work lol.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 years ago

    In future we all expect you to list the average tax rate you are in and which two tax brackets that it lies between by calculating all the taxes paid and dividing by your gross wages then looking up the tax code to verify it has not changed. Please provide sources every time on your tax code.

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  • [–] -2 points 3 years ago (1 child)

    You're just repeating the same thing you said in the last comment and ignoring everything I wrote. Nowhere did I say that you need to list every bracket. I said people don't talk about "their tax bracket" because that isn't a thing and that isn't their tax bracket. It's just a percentage that some potentially miniscule amount of tax that may apply to a further potentially tiny fraction of income and in no way represents how much they're paying in taxes.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 years ago

    and in no way represents how much they’re paying in taxes.

    It does actually, because if you are any amount into tax bracket n, you are already implicitly paying the maximum taxes of brackets 1 to n-1

    For example in Canada, federal tax brackets are:

    • 15% up to $53,359
    • 20.5% between $53,359 and $106,717
    • 29% between $165,430 up to $235,675 ...

    If I say I am in the third tax bracket, that already implicitly informs you of how much taxes I am paying for the first and second brackets, because by being in the third bracket I already am paying the maximum amount for brackets one and two. These are now fixed values implicitly.

    If I am in the third tax bracket, you know I am paying at minimum $8003.85 + $10938.39 (the maximums of bracket 1 and 2 combined), and at most another $20,371 above that.

    No more, no less, the "third tax bracket" is paying between $18,942.24 and $39,313.24 per year.

    So yes, it is a specific and fixed "range" of taxes.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 years ago

    I can't tell if you're being serious - and so the world's biggest pedant, or if you're just the kind of person who can never admit they were wrong, even about something inconsequential, and aren't willing to admit you misread the top comment lol

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