FICA Tax Calculator

What FICA is and where your 7.65 percent goes

FICA stands for the Federal Insurance Contributions Act. It is the flat payroll tax taken out of every paycheck to fund Social Security and Medicare. For 2026 the employee share is 6.2 percent of wages for Social Security plus 1.45 percent for Medicare, a combined 7.65 percent. On a 1,000 dollar paycheck that is 1,000 x 0.0765 = 76.50.

FICA is not income tax, and the two never mix. Income tax depends on filing status, deductions and credits. FICA does not: the same 7.65 percent applies to the first dollar and to the hundred thousandth, with one ceiling on the Social Security piece and one surcharge at high incomes, both covered below. It is also flat against your pay period: a bonus, overtime and commission all take the same 7.65 percent as regular wages.

Who pays it depends on how you earn. Employees and employers each pay half, 7.65 percent apiece. Freelancers and sole proprietors pay both halves under SECA, the self-employment version of the same law, at 15.3 percent. The employer half never shows up on your pay stub, which is why the total cost of a job is double what you see withheld.

The 2026 numbers, confirmed at the source

The Social Security Administration sets the wage base each fall. For 2026 the OASDI contribution and benefit base is 184,500 dollars, up from 176,100 in 2025 (SSA 2026 fact sheet and the Federal Register notice of November 2025). The 6.2 percent rate applies to wages up to that base; wages above it owe no more Social Security tax that year. Medicare has no ceiling at all: the SSA 2026 fact sheet confirms 1.45 percent for employee and employer each, and 2.9 percent for the self-employed.

One forward looking note: the SSA has already announced the 2027 base as 192,300 dollars, in its October 2026 announcement, so always check the year before you reuse these figures.

Two ceilings worth computing now. 184,500 x 0.062 = 11,439.00 is the most anyone pays in employee Social Security tax for 2026, and 184,500 x 0.0145 = 2,675.25 is the Medicare due at that same wage. Together, 11,439.00 + 2,675.25 = 14,114.25 is the base FICA bill for an employee at the cap.

Employee FICA on a full year of wages

Worked example 1, a 60,000 dollar salary: Social Security is 60,000 x 0.062 = 3,720.00. Medicare is 60,000 x 0.0145 = 870.00. The total is 3,720.00 + 870.00 = 4,590.00, or 382.50 a month.

Worked example 2, a 250,000 dollar salary for a single filer: Social Security stops at the cap, so 184,500 x 0.062 = 11,439.00. Medicare runs on the full amount: 250,000 x 0.0145 = 3,625.00. The extra 0.9 percent applies to wages above 200,000: (250,000 - 200,000) x 0.009 = 450.00. Employee total: 11,439.00 + 3,625.00 + 450.00 = 15,514.00.

Notice the shape. FICA climbs in a straight 7.65 percent line until the wage base, then flattens: past 184,500 dollars only Medicare and the surcharge keep growing. The effective FICA rate therefore falls as pay rises, from 7.65 percent at 100,000 down to 19,039.00 / 400,000 = 4.76 percent at 400,000. The single filer column assumes 250,000 and up clears the 200,000 threshold; married joint filers pay no surcharge until 250,000.

The additional 0.9 percent Medicare tax

A 0.9 percent surcharge applies to Medicare wages and self-employment income above a threshold set by filing status (IRS Topic no. 560, tax year 2026):

Three rules people miss. First, the threshold counts combined Medicare wages plus self-employment income for the tax year, and for a joint return it combines both spouses. Two spouses earning 130,000 dollars each file jointly: 130,000 + 130,000 = 260,000, which is 10,000 over the 250,000 threshold, so the surcharge is 10,000 x 0.009 = 90.00, even though neither paycheck crossed 200,000.

Second, your employer starts withholding the 0.9 percent once your own wages pass 200,000 dollars, with no look at how you file (IRS Topic 560). A joint filer who crosses 200,000 has the surcharge withheld all year and then settles up on Form 8959, where the true 250,000 threshold applies.

Third, the employer never matches this piece. It is employee money only, with no employer counterpart on the pay stub.

The employer match: why a job costs more than the paycheck shows

Every dollar of employee FICA has a twin. The employer pays its own 6.2 percent Social Security plus 1.45 percent Medicare on the same wages, another 7.65 percent. On the 60,000 dollar salary from earlier, the employer adds 60,000 x 0.0765 = 4,590.00, so the combined FICA cost of that salary is 4,590.00 + 4,590.00 = 9,180.00.

At the wage base the employer maximum is 11,439.00 + 2,675.25 = 14,114.25, the same as the employee bill at that wage. Past the cap the employer keeps paying only the 1.45 percent Medicare piece, with no ceiling and no surcharge, since the 0.9 percent is never matched.

Two consequences follow. Economists treat the employer half as part of compensation, meaning gross wages would be higher if the match did not exist. And when a business prices a hire, the true cost is the salary plus 7.65 percent, plus benefits and insurance, which is why a 50,000 dollar employee costs at least 50,000 x 1.0765 = 53,825.00 before anything else.

The match also explains the self-employed rate that follows: a freelancer occupies both roles at once, employer and employee, and SECA charges for both seats.

Self-employed: SECA and the 92.35 percent rule

Freelancers and sole proprietors owe the same taxes under a different law, the Self-Employment Contributions Act. The rate is both halves at once: 15.3 percent, made of 12.4 percent Social Security plus 2.9 percent Medicare. To keep things fair against W-2 workers, the tax applies to 92.35 percent of net profit instead of the full amount, because an employee never pays FICA on the employer share. The factor falls out of the arithmetic: 100 - 7.65 = 92.35, where 7.65 is half of the 15.3 rate.

Worked example, 100,000 dollars of net profit: the taxed base is 100,000 x 0.9235 = 92,350. Social Security is 92,350 x 0.124 = 11,451.40. Medicare is 92,350 x 0.029 = 2,678.15. Total: 11,451.40 + 2,678.15 = 14,129.55. A W-2 worker earning the same 92,350 dollars would see 92,350 x 0.0765 = 7,064.78 withheld, and the employer would quietly add the same amount, so both halves come to 92,350 x 0.153 = 14,129.55. That comparison is the whole story of SECA: the freelancer pays both visible halves.

The Social Security piece still caps: 184,500 x 0.124 = 22,878.00 is the most the SE version charges, and that cap is reached once your 92.35 percent adjusted profit hits 184,500, or 184,500 / 0.9235 = 199,783.44 of net profit. Half of the SE tax is deductible when you file, here about 14,129.55 / 2 = 7,064.78. For quarterly set asides and the deduction mechanics in depth, the self-employment tax calculator on this site walks that side step by step.

How the calculator works, and what it does not do

The widget has two modes. Wage mode takes your 2026 wages and filing status, then reports the Social Security piece at 6.2 percent up to 184,500, the Medicare piece at 1.45 percent on everything, the additional 0.9 percent above your filing status threshold, the employee total, the employer match and the combined cost. Self-employment mode applies the 92.35 percent factor, uses 12.4 and 2.9 percent, applies the same 0.9 percent threshold logic, and shows the employee share plus the combined cost if the same work were a W-2 job. With 100,000 dollars of profit it returns a taxed base of 92,350 and an SE tax of 14,129.55.

Where the numbers come from: the 184,500 wage base and the 6.2, 1.45, 12.4 and 2.9 percent rates are from the SSA 2026 fact sheet and the SSA contribution and benefit base table; the 0.9 percent thresholds and the 200,000 withholding rule are from IRS Topic 560 (2026); the 92.35 percent factor comes from IRS Schedule SE (Form 1040).

This page is an estimate for planning, not tax advice. It does not combine a W-2 job with freelance profit in one pass; run the two modes separately and add the results, minding that the Social Security cap is shared across both. Railroad workers under RRTA and some visa categories follow different rules. Rates and the base change each year, and the SSA has already posted 192,300 for 2027, so confirm figures with the official sources or a tax professional before you rely on them.