Enter a few numbers and get an itemized breakdown of the taxes you pay in a year, and what the federal government, the state, your county and your city spend them on.
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Sales tax isn't included yet.
A rough estimate to show where tax money goes, not tax advice. Your actual taxes depend on deductions, credits and other income.
Enter your income to see where your taxes go.
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See what's on your ballot ↗Tax money goes into shared pots, so no one can trace your exact dollars. Each line shows your share of what that government spends, in proportion to its budget.
Where you live: the breakdown uses one place, your main home. If you have two homes, each home's property tax goes to that home's local governments, and sales tax goes to wherever you shop. In Indiana, county income tax goes to the county you lived in on January 1.
Tax year: pick 2025 if you're using last year's tax return, or 2026 to estimate this year. The tax math uses that year's brackets, deductions and rates, including local rates that changed partway through 2025 (averaged over the year). Federal spending is that year's actual spending (the federal year runs October to September). State and local spending follows each government's current budget for both years. Budgets usually shift only a few percent from year to year.
Federal: tax brackets and standard deduction for the year you pick, including the extra deductions for people 65 and older, the child tax credit and the Earned Income Tax Credit. It assumes you take the standard deduction and have no other income (like interest, dividends or capital gains) or other credits. Up to 85% of Social Security benefits can be taxed, depending on your other income. Self-employment income pays both halves of Social Security and Medicare tax, minus the usual deductions for it. Social Security and Medicare taxes are shown going to those programs. Refundable credits that come back to you as a refund are shown separately, not subtracted from your total. Income tax is split by what the government actually spent on everything except Social Security, which is paid from its own tax, in the federal year you pick (fiscal 2025 or 2026), by area and by program, from the U.S. Treasury's final Monthly Treasury Statement for that year. The government also borrows, so total spending is larger than taxes collected.
Gas: gas spending is turned into gallons using an average pump price for the year you pick, then taxed per gallon. Every gallon includes the 18.4-cent federal gas tax, which goes to the federal Highway Trust Fund for highway and transit grants to states. Gas isn't charged regular sales tax, so leave it out of your shopping.
New Jersey income tax: 1.4% on the first $20,000 of taxable income, rising to 10.75% above $1 million. Single filers pay 1.75% up to $35,000, 3.5% up to $40,000, 5.525% up to $75,000 and 6.37% up to $500,000; married couples filing jointly and heads of household pay 1.75% up to $50,000, 2.45% up to $70,000, 3.5% up to $80,000, 5.525% up to $150,000 and 6.37% up to $500,000; both pay 8.97% from $500,000 to $1 million. The rates are the same for 2025 and 2026. New Jersey starts from wages, business profit and pensions (it doesn't let you subtract half of self-employment tax) and doesn't tax Social Security. If income is $20,000 or less ($10,000 for single filers), no tax is due. Exemptions: $1,000 for each adult, $1,000 more for each person 65 or older, and $1,500 for each dependent. People 62 or older can exclude pension and IRA income: up to $100,000 for couples and $75,000 for single filers when total income is $100,000 or less, a share of it up to $150,000 of income, and none above that. Military pensions aren't taxed at any age, and they don't count toward these income limits. Government pensions are taxed like other pensions. This page applies it when someone in the household is 65 or older.
Credits: homeowners can deduct up to $15,000 of property tax, or take a $50 refundable credit instead, whichever helps more; renters can deduct 18% of their rent, which this page doesn't ask for, so it gives renters the $50 credit. The New Jersey Earned Income Tax Credit is 40% of the federal credit and is refundable. Workers 65 or older with no children are too old for the federal credit, but since 2021 New Jersey gives them its credit anyway if their income is under the federal limit: 40% of the largest federal credit for a worker with no children. The New Jersey Child Tax Credit (for children under 6, families with taxable income up to $80,000: $200 to $1,000 a child for 2025, and 25% more, $250 to $1,250, for 2026 through 2028) isn't included because this page doesn't ask children's ages. Itemized-style deductions for medical costs, college tuition and other credits aren't modeled.
Property tax relief checks: New Jersey pays these separately, after you apply, so they're shown as money back, not subtracted from your taxes. ANCHOR (2025 benefit year): $1,500 for homeowners with income up to $150,000 and $1,000 up to $250,000, $450 for renters with income up to $150,000, and $250 more for anyone 65 or older. Stay NJ, for homeowners 65 or older, tops up ANCHOR and the Senior Freeze to half the property tax bill, up to $6,500 with income up to $100,000, $5,000 up to $150,000 and $4,000 up to $200,000; the FY2027 budget (signed June 30, 2026) lowered the income limit from $500,000 to $200,000 and set these tiers starting with the 2025 benefit year, paid in 2027. The same rules are used for 2026, since that year's amounts aren't set yet. The Senior Freeze (it repays increases in a senior's bill since their base year) isn't included because it depends on past bills. All benefits together can't be more than the property tax bill.
Paycheck insurance: every New Jersey worker pays into state insurance funds. For 2025: 0.425% of the first $43,300 of wages for unemployment insurance and job training, 0.23% for disability insurance and 0.33% for family leave insurance on wages up to $165,400. For 2026: 0.425% of the first $44,800, and 0.19% and 0.23% on wages up to $171,100. A couple's wages are taken as split evenly. Self-employment income isn't covered.
Where state taxes go: the state Constitution sends all income tax money to the Property Tax Relief Fund, which pays only for school aid, aid to towns and direct property tax relief. So your income tax is split the way that fund's appropriations are split: for FY2026 (July 2025 to June 2026) $22.45 billion, of which $16.6 billion went to schools (including the state's payments for teachers' pensions and Social Security), $3.0 billion to property tax relief checks and $2.2 billion to municipal aid; for FY2027 $24.1 billion. About 8.3% of the sales tax goes to the same fund; the rest goes to the General Fund, split here by department ($35.5 billion in FY2027: Medicaid and human services, state worker pensions and benefits, schools, transportation, colleges and the rest). The General Fund split uses the FY2027 enacted budget for both years.
Sales tax: 6.625% everywhere in New Jersey, with no local sales tax. Food for home, most clothing and shoes, and prescription drugs aren't taxed. Some stores in Urban Enterprise Zones charge half the rate (3.3125%); this page uses the full rate. Hotel, meals-in-Atlantic-City and other special taxes aren't included. Newark and Jersey City have payroll taxes that employers pay, not workers, so they're not on your receipt.
Property tax: your home's value times your town's 2025 effective tax rate, which the state figures from the general tax rate and how close assessments are to market value. 2026 rates weren't complete for every county, so 2025 rates are used for both years. The bill is split into its county, school and municipal parts using the state's 2025 table of the average home's property tax bill in every town, split into county, school and municipal taxes (Division of Local Government Services, 2025 Property Tax Information). For 232 towns, the 2025 breakdown from the county Abstracts of Ratables (all of Camden, Cape May, Cumberland, Hudson, Hunterdon, Mercer, Middlesex, Passaic, Salem, Somerset and Sussex counties, most of Union, and Newark) is used instead; it matches the state table within 2 percentage points in all but four towns. In Bayonne and Harrison the two differ by 2 to 3 points, so the state table is used. In Union City and Weehawken the state table's total rate is lower than the rate on the bill, so the county abstract, which adds up to the bill's rate, is kept. Winfield and Audubon Park, where homes are owned through a mutual housing corporation, use their county's median rate. As a check, the effective rates times each county's Census median home value come within 10% of the median tax the Census reports for 2019-2023 in the 11 counties where that figure isn't capped. Fire district taxes, special improvement districts and veterans' and seniors' deductions aren't included.
Cities and towns, counties and schools: The four biggest cities are split by their own 2026 budgets, department by department: Newark ($1.11 billion); Elizabeth ($347.8 million, adopted November 25, 2025); Jersey City ($862.1 million of its $886.5 million introduced budget, leaving out programs paid by state and federal grants; the council adopted a slightly smaller budget, $886.4 million, on August 26, 2026, but the adopted department amounts weren't available, so the introduced ones are used); and Paterson ($324.4 million of its $346.1 million introduced budget, leaving out grant programs; the council approved it for introduction on October 13, 2026, and it may still change before it's adopted). Those budgets also include costs that New Jersey towns have to budget for, like money set aside for taxes that won't be collected on time and paying off past shortfalls. The other towns and the counties are split by what they spent, as reported to the U.S. Census Bureau (2022 or 2024), leaving out utilities and other services paid by fees. In about 20 towns, such as Trenton and Bayonne, the Census counts the school district inside the town; that school spending is left out of the town's split because your bill's school part is shown separately. County breakdowns include county vocational schools and county colleges. The school part is split the way New Jersey public schools spend money per student (2020-21, from the federal National Center for Education Statistics, Digest of Education Statistics Table 236.75): teachers and instruction, student support, buildings, school offices and the rest.
New Jersey gas taxes: the motor fuels tax and the petroleum products gross receipts tax together are 44.9 cents a gallon for 2025 and 49.1 cents from January 1, 2026. A 2024 law raises the Transportation Trust Fund's yearly amount through 2029 and Treasury resets the rate each January to match. The state Constitution dedicates the money to the Transportation Trust Fund; its FY2025 program was $833 million for NJDOT, $767 million for NJ TRANSIT and $400 million for local road aid, which is the split used here. Gas isn't charged sales tax. Average gas prices used: $3.10 a gallon for 2025 and $3.85 for 2026 (federal EIA East Coast prices for all grades, January to October 2026).
Still estimated: 2026 property tax rates and the 2026 county / school / municipal split (2025 is used for both years), the Jersey City and Paterson department amounts (introduced, not adopted), department splits from Census spending for the other towns and counties, the General Fund split for FY2026, the Stay NJ and ANCHOR rules for 2026, assessments that differ from market value, and the average gas prices.
Not included: the Child Tax Credit, the Senior Freeze, renters' rent deduction, fire district taxes, Urban Enterprise Zone sales tax, hotel and other special taxes, and employer payroll taxes.
New Jersey sources: Pension exclusion (Division of Taxation) · ANCHOR amounts · Stay NJ calculation · Stay NJ income tiers · Child Tax Credit increase (fiscal note) · Paycheck insurance rates (NJ Labor) · FY2027 Budget in Brief · FY2027 Appropriations Act scoresheet (OLS) · FY2027 Appropriations Handbook · 2025 general and effective tax rates · County Abstracts of Ratables · Census median property tax by county · 2026 gas tax rate (Treasury) · 2025 gas tax rate · Transportation Trust Fund program · East Coast gas prices (EIA) · U.S. Census local government finances · Budgets: Newark · Jersey City · Paterson and Elizabeth: the cities' 2026 budget documents (state budget forms) · 2025 average property tax bills by town (DLGS)
Federal sources: U.S. Treasury Monthly Treasury Statement, FY2025 and FY2026 · 2025 IRS brackets · 2026 IRS brackets · Federal gas tax (FHWA)
A married couple with two kids under 17. They earn $80,000 a year from work, spend $25,000 a year on shopping (not counting groceries) and $1,500 on gas, and rent their home. These are their 2026 taxes.
They pay about $10,976 a year in taxes. Here's where it goes.
Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and interest on the debt run on existing laws, so they change only when Congress changes those laws. Most other spending is voted on every year.
An estimate to show where tax money goes, not tax advice. Use the calculator above to see your own numbers.