Kettering to Dayton
Ohio municipal income tax, Chapter 718 framework · credit set by Kettering ordinance · tax year 2026
Work city takes
2.5%
Dayton, on income earned there
Home city charges
2.25%
Kettering, residents
Credit back
$1,350
capped by the ceiling
Cost of the commute
$150
a year, above working at home
What it costs you
ceiling bindsKettering'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 Kettering 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. Kettering will credit tax paid to Dayton, but only up to about 2.25% of what you earn. Past that point you pay Kettering too. The gap runs to $150 over a year, on top of $1,500 already withheld where you work.
- Kettering is the biggest single source of workers for Dayton. Around 5,270 people make the trip, ahead of every other origin the data records, 11 in all. That is why this pairing is worth setting out rather than leaving people to work out alone.
- This is a well-traveled road. About 5,270 people go from Kettering to work in Dayton. That is a lot of households meeting the same rule at the same time.
- The credit here is real but bounded. Kettering allows residents about 100% of tax paid to another municipality, subject to a ceiling of about 2.25% of income, and on this pairing it is the ceiling rather than the share that binds. Dayton withholds $1,500 at about 2.5%; Kettering returns $1,350 of that and collects the remainder of its own about 2.25% resident levy. The workplace accordingly costs $150 above the home-only position, against a total of $1,500.
- This is the largest recorded flow into Dayton. Of 11 origins feeding that workplace in this dataset, Kettering supplies the most workers at approximately 5,270. The credit outcome described above therefore applies to more commuters than any other single route into the city, which matters when the outcome is an adverse one: the same ordinance governs every origin, but the populations behind each are very different.
- Census origin-destination statistics record approximately 5,270 workers commuting from Kettering to Dayton, placing this among the larger intra-state flows in Ohio. The outcome set out above therefore has aggregate fiscal consequence for both municipalities, not merely individual consequence for the worker: the credit Kettering does or does not extend is applied to every one of them at once.
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
| Dayton takes, on income earned there | $1,500 |
|---|---|
| Kettering charges residents | $1,350 |
| Less the credit Kettering gives back | $1,350 |
| Total local tax | $1,500 |
| If you also lived in Dayton | $1,350 |
| 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
- Do not add the two rates up, and do not assume the bigger one simply wins. Neither is how Ohio works. Both Dayton and Kettering charge you. Kettering may then hand back what Dayton took, or part of it, or none of it. Everything on this page turns on which of those it does.
- These figures rest on a local rule, not a state one. Kettering decides how much credit to give for tax already paid to Dayton. It is worth confirming the current position with the city or its collection agency, because this is the part most likely to have changed.
- This page covers city income tax only. Your school district may charge its own on top, and many in Ohio do. That one follows your address in Kettering rather than your workplace in Dayton, and it is not credited against anything.
- One tax is on this page and it is the city one. State tax, federal tax and Social Security all still come out of your pay. None of them change when you cross the line between Kettering and Dayton. That is exactly why they are left out.
- The dollar figures rest on one assumed salary, sixty thousand. Double your pay and they double. Halve it and they halve. What stays put is the relationship between what Dayton charges and what Kettering gives back, which is the part worth carrying away.
- 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. Dayton taxes what is earned within its boundaries, Kettering taxes its residents on everything, and Kettering then credits some, all or none of what Dayton collected. The credit is the entire mechanism, and it is set by Kettering rather than by the state.
- The credit rule modeled here is Kettering's own, adopted by ordinance and amendable by Kettering 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 Kettering can therefore change every figure on this page without anything altering in Dayton 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 Dayton, and no municipal credit applies to it. A resident of Kettering 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 Kettering and Dayton, 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 Kettering to Dayton 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 Dayton costs about 2.5%; living in Kettering costs about 2.25%, reduced by whatever share of the work tax the home city recognizes.
What does crossing this boundary actually cost me?
About $150 a year. That is the gap between this commute and an identical job in Kettering, and it exists purely because the boundary sits between them.
Is this a common enough commute to be worth modeling?
Yes — 5,270 people make this exact journey, according to the federal employment survey that tracks where workers live against where they work. Routes below a volume floor are not published, so a page existing here means the commute is real and measured.
How does a resident credit allocate liability between two municipalities?
Both jurisdictions assert a claim: Dayton on the basis of work location at about 2.5%, Kettering on residence at about 2.25%. 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 basis for including this route?
Route volume is 5,270 workers, sourced from Census LODES origin-destination data. Pairs below the publication threshold are excluded rather than imputed, so page existence reflects measured commuting volume.