Category: Paychecks & Work
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The overtime deduction doubles to $25,000 for a couple filing jointly, phasing out above $300,000.
A married couple who both work overtime shifts — one at a hospital, the other at a warehouse — face a filing decision that a single overtime earner never has to think about: whether filing separately could ever make sense once this deduction is on the table. For this particular tax break, the law already…
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A tipped worker’s occupation code sits in box 14b, beside the tip total in box 12.
The Form W-2 that tipped workers receive for the 2026 tax year looks different from every version that came before it. Where box 14 used to be a single catch-all for miscellaneous items an employer wanted to note, it now splits into two: box 14a for the old leftover items, and a brand-new box 14b…
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Workers who think overtime is missing from a W-2 are told to ask for a corrected form, not to redo the math.
Late in tax season, a familiar complaint starts showing up in payroll and tax-prep offices alike: an employee’s last pay stub of the year shows thousands of dollars in overtime pay, but the new box on the Form W-2 meant to report it for the tax deduction comes back at zero, or far lower than…
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The tip and overtime break is a deduction claimed on a return, so payroll taxes still come out of every check.
A line cook picks up his first paycheck after hearing that Congress passed a law wiping out taxes on overtime, and nothing about the check has changed. The federal income tax withholding line looks the same. The Social Security and Medicare lines look the same. That isn’t a payroll error. The relief created by the…
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National Payroll Week is the IRS’s cue for a withholding checkup.
The IRS marked the start of National Payroll Week, observed September 7 through 11 this year, with a reminder that the week is as much a nudge for workers as it is a tribute to the people who run payroll. In a release issued September 4 (IR-2026-105), the agency encouraged employees to take a fresh…
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A Labor Department proposal would rewrite who counts as an independent contractor, and workers reclassified that way would lose overtime and minimum-wage rights.
The U.S. Department of Labor wants to rewrite the rule that decides who counts as an employee and who counts as an independent contractor under federal wage law, and that single label determines who is guaranteed overtime pay and a minimum wage and who is not. The department’s Wage and Hour Division published the proposal…
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The same contractor test would be extended to family and medical leave and to farmworker protections, well beyond the wage law it was written for.
A federal proposal aimed at rewriting who counts as an employee versus an independent contractor under wage law would not stop at wage law. The Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division wants the same classification test it is proposing for the Fair Labor Standards Act to also decide who is covered under the Family…
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A Mississippi blues club will pay $35,000 over a co-owner accused of harassment
A Biloxi, Mississippi music venue has agreed to pay $35,000 to settle a federal lawsuit accusing one of its co-owners of sexually harassing an employee and accusing the company of firing her for reporting it. The case, brought by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission against Ground Zero Biloxi LLC, is a reminder that federal harassment…
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Openings covered 4.4 percent of all American jobs in July, a rate that has barely moved since spring
Beneath the raw count of 7.3 million job openings that made headlines on September 1 sits a simpler number: the job openings rate, which measures openings as a share of all jobs, filled and unfilled combined. In July, that rate was 4.4 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and it has stayed inside…
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Employers hired 5.1 million people in July, let 1.7 million go, and watched 3.1 million walk out on their own
The government’s clearest monthly snapshot of hiring and firing showed a labor market still moving in both directions at a steady clip in July. Employers hired 5.1 million people, let go of 1.7 million through layoffs and discharges, and watched another 3.1 million walk out the door on their own by quitting. All three figures,…
