Akron to Wadsworth
Ohio municipal income tax, Chapter 718 framework · credit set by Akron ordinance · tax year 2026
Work city takes
1.4%
Wadsworth, on income earned there
Home city charges
2.5%
Akron, residents
Credit back
$840
a share of the work tax
Cost of the commute
$0
a year, above working at home
What it costs you
no extra local taxAkron credits only part of what Wadsworth takes, so the remainder is taxed twice. Solid is what you pay; the faded part of the Akron bar is the credit it hands back. Municipal income tax only — state, federal and payroll tax apply on top, and an Ohio school district income tax may too.
What this commute actually costs
- Here is the good news. Working in Wadsworth costs you nothing extra in local tax. Akron charges residents about 2.5%, and it credits back every dollar Wadsworth collects from you. Either way your bill is $1,500 a year. What changes is which city keeps the money, not how much of it you hand over.
- Worth watching rather than worrying about. The credit from Akron runs out once Wadsworth takes more than the ceiling allows, and today there is $660 a year of slack. A rate rise in Wadsworth would eat into that first, and into your pay after.
- Wadsworth shows just one commuting route in this data, and it starts in Akron. Roughly 806 people make the trip. That is not the whole picture of who works there, only the part large enough to be published.
- This pairing is neutral to the worker. Wadsworth withholds about 1.4% on income earned there, and Akron, which levies about 2.5% on residents, credits that payment in full without reaching its own ceiling. Liability at the reference salary is therefore $1,500 — precisely what the same earnings would attract with no commute at all. What the arrangement alters is the division of revenue between Wadsworth and Akron, not the sum leaving the worker's pay.
- The margin is worth knowing, because it is not large. Akron credits tax paid to Wadsworth only up to a ceiling set as a share of income, and Wadsworth's levy currently sits below it with $660 of annual room to spare at the reference salary. Were Wadsworth to raise its rate past that point, the excess would cease to be credited and would fall on the worker rather than on either treasury.
- Within this dataset Wadsworth draws a single recorded commuting flow of qualifying size — the one from Akron, carrying roughly 806 workers. That reflects the reporting floor rather than the labor market: smaller flows certainly exist and fall below the threshold at which Census origin-destination statistics are published. No ranking against sibling routes is therefore available for this workplace.
Where the money goes
A $75,000 salary
- Federal income tax$7,670
- Social Security and Medicare$5,738
- State income tax$1,346
- Yours$60,246
| Federal income tax10.23% | $7,670 |
|---|---|
| Social Security and Medicare7.65% | $5,738 |
| State income tax1.79% | $1,346 |
| Yours80.33% | $60,246 |
The arithmetic, step by step
| Wadsworth takes, on income earned there | $840 |
|---|---|
| Akron charges residents | $1,500 |
| Less the credit Akron gives back | $840 |
| Total local tax | $1,500 |
| If you also lived in Wadsworth | $1,500 |
| Difference | $0 |
On a reference salary of $60,000 a year. Both rates and the credit ceiling are shares of income, so every figure scales with your own pay.
What this page does not cover
- Here is the shape of it, because the arithmetic is easy to get wrong. You are taxed by both cities. What happens next is up to Akron: it may credit all of what Wadsworth took, some of it, or none at all. That choice belongs to the city rather than to the state, which is why identical salaries in neighboring towns land so differently.
- One thing to keep in mind. Ohio does not require Akron to give any credit at all. That choice sits with the city, and cities revisit it. A vote in Akron could change what this commute to Wadsworth costs you, with no change in the law itself.
- Ohio has a second local tax that is not on this page. Some school districts levy their own income tax. It depends on where you live, not on your job in Wadsworth, and the credit from Akron does not touch it. If your district charges one, add it to everything here.
- These figures are the local layer alone. Whatever Akron and Wadsworth take sits on top of state, federal and payroll tax. Those three are the same wherever in Ohio you work, so putting them in would bury the difference this page is about.
- Every dollar amount here uses a salary of sixty thousand a year. It is a benchmark, not a guess at what people in Akron earn, because nobody publishes average pay for single municipalities. Scale the figures to your own salary. The rates and the credit work the same way at any income, so the Wadsworth conclusion holds.
- Two misreadings bracket the correct answer and both are common. Ohio does not simply add the two rates together, which would overstate the charge; nor does it apply only the higher of them, which is Pennsylvania's rule and would understate it wherever the credit is partial. Wadsworth taxes what is earned within its boundaries, Akron taxes its residents on everything, and Akron then credits some, all or none of what Wadsworth collected. The credit is the entire mechanism, and it is set by Akron rather than by the state.
- The credit rule modeled here is Akron's own, adopted by ordinance and amendable by Akron alone. Ohio's uniform framework governs definitions, filing and withholding; it does not compel any municipality to credit tax paid to another. A council vote in Akron can therefore change every figure on this page without anything altering in Wadsworth or in state law, which is a materially different exposure from a rate set by statute.
- Ohio school district income tax is a separate levy from municipal income tax and is excluded from these figures. It is imposed by school district of residence rather than by municipality, it is unaffected by employment in Wadsworth, and no municipal credit applies to it. A resident of Akron whose school district levies one owes it in addition to everything shown here, which is why the totals on this page are a municipal position rather than a complete local one.
- Only municipal income tax is modeled. Ohio's state income tax, federal income tax and payroll taxes all apply in addition and are invariant to the boundary between Akron and Wadsworth, which is precisely why they are excluded: isolating the layer that responds to the commute is the point of the comparison. A complete tax position requires adding them; a comparison of the two locations does not.
- Dollar figures are computed against a stated reference salary of sixty thousand rather than a municipal wage average, which no published source provides for Ohio municipalities. Both rates and the credit ceiling are proportional to income, so every figure scales linearly: the Akron to Wadsworth differential doubles at twice the salary and halves at half of it, and the rate relationship holds at every level. The one caveat is that whether the ceiling binds at all is itself scale-invariant here, because it too is expressed as a share of income rather than as a fixed dollar cap.
Questions people ask
Do I pay local tax twice — once where I work and once where I live?
You are taxed by both, then given credit for one. Working in Wadsworth costs about 1.4%; living in Akron costs about 2.5%, reduced by whatever share of the work tax the home city recognizes.
Does working in a different town cost me anything?
Not a cent on this one. The crossing changes where the money is sent, not how much of it leaves, so your total matches a stay-at-home commute.
Is this commute common enough for the numbers to mean anything?
It is a smaller route: 806 workers. That affects how representative it is, not whether the tax arithmetic applies — the rules are the same on a quiet road as a busy one.
How does a resident credit allocate liability between two municipalities?
Both jurisdictions assert a claim: Wadsworth on the basis of work location at about 1.4%, Akron on residence at about 2.5%. The residence municipality grants a credit for tax paid to the work municipality, commonly capped as a share of income. Net liability is the residence tax less that credit, floored at zero, plus the work tax.
Why is the marginal cost of this crossing zero?
Marginal liability from working outside the residence jurisdiction is zero on this route. The crossing alters the distribution of revenue between jurisdictions but not the employee's total. ⚠️ This is route-specific and does not generalise to other pairs in the same dataset.
What is the measurement basis for a route of this size?
Route volume is 806 workers per Census LODES, above the publication floor but below the dataset's upper quartile. Liability is determined by jurisdictional rates and residence rules alone; commuter volume has no bearing on it and is reported only as context.