Fairborn to Kettering
Ohio municipal income tax, Chapter 718 framework · credit set by Fairborn ordinance · tax year 2026
Work city takes
2.25%
Kettering, on income earned there
Home city charges
2%
Fairborn, residents
Credit back
$1,200
capped by the ceiling
Cost of the commute
$150
a year, above working at home
What it costs you
ceiling bindsFairborn's credit stops at its ceiling, so the rest of its own tax still applies. Solid is what you pay; the faded part of the Fairborn 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
- There is a ceiling on this, and you have hit it. Fairborn will credit tax paid to Kettering, but only up to about 2% of what you earn. Past that point you pay Fairborn too. The gap runs to $150 over a year, on top of $1,350 already withheld where you work.
- This route from Fairborn is 2 of 3 recorded commutes into Kettering, with around 786 people on it. Treat the ranking loosely. Only flows above a certain size are published at all.
- The credit here is real but bounded. Fairborn allows residents about 100% of tax paid to another municipality, subject to a ceiling of about 2% of income, and on this pairing it is the ceiling rather than the share that binds. Kettering withholds $1,350 at about 2.25%; Fairborn returns $1,200 of that and collects the remainder of its own about 2% resident levy. The workplace accordingly costs $150 above the home-only position, against a total of $1,350.
- Kettering records 3 qualifying commuting origins in this dataset, of which Fairborn ranks 2 by worker count at approximately 786. A workplace of this size draws from a small enough set of origins that the comparison is indicative rather than statistical, and the published floor excludes an unknown tail of smaller flows.
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
| Kettering takes, on income earned there | $1,350 |
|---|---|
| Fairborn charges residents | $1,200 |
| Less the credit Fairborn gives back | $1,200 |
| Total local tax | $1,350 |
| If you also lived in Kettering | $1,200 |
| Difference | $150 |
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
- Two guesses about this are wrong, and they miss in opposite directions. The rates are not added together. Nor do you simply pay whichever is higher, which is how it works across the border in Pennsylvania. Kettering taxes what you earn there, Fairborn taxes everything you earn, and then Fairborn decides how much of the first bill to give back.
- One thing to keep in mind. Ohio does not require Fairborn to give any credit at all. That choice sits with the city, and cities revisit it. A vote in Fairborn could change what this commute to Kettering 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 Kettering, and the credit from Fairborn does not touch it. If your district charges one, add it to everything here.
- These figures are the local layer alone. Whatever Fairborn and Kettering 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 Fairborn 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 Kettering 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. Kettering taxes what is earned within its boundaries, Fairborn taxes its residents on everything, and Fairborn then credits some, all or none of what Kettering collected. The credit is the entire mechanism, and it is set by Fairborn rather than by the state.
- The credit rule modeled here is Fairborn's own, adopted by ordinance and amendable by Fairborn 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 Fairborn can therefore change every figure on this page without anything altering in Kettering 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 Kettering, and no municipal credit applies to it. A resident of Fairborn 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 Fairborn and Kettering, 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 Fairborn to Kettering 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?
Both places charge you, but the city you live in gives back some of what the other one took. Kettering taxes you for working there at about 2.25%; Fairborn then charges its own about 2% and credits part of the first against it. Whether anything is left over depends on how generous that credit is.
What does crossing this boundary actually cost me?
Working across the line costs $150 a year here. The same salary earned in Fairborn would not carry it.
Is this commute common enough for the numbers to mean anything?
It is a smaller route: 786 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: Kettering on the basis of work location at about 2.25%, Fairborn on residence at about 2%. 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.
What is the marginal local tax cost of this commute?
Marginal annual liability attributable to working outside the residence jurisdiction is $150 at the reference salary. This is a tax cost rather than a commuting expense and is not deductible as one. It scales with income and with the rate differential, not with distance traveled.
What is the measurement basis for a route of this size?
Route volume is 786 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.