Mason to Blue Ash
Ohio municipal income tax, Chapter 718 framework · credit set by Mason ordinance · tax year 2026
Work city takes
1.25%
Blue Ash, on income earned there
Home city charges
1.12%
Mason, residents
Credit back
$672
capped by the ceiling
Cost of the commute
$78
a year, above working at home
What it costs you
ceiling bindsMason'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 Mason 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
- Mason does credit you for the tax Blue Ash takes. It just stops early. The credit cannot pass about 1.12% of your income, and Blue Ash charges more than that, so it runs out before the bill does. Working there costs $78 a year more than working at home would. All in, local tax is $750.
- Blue Ash draws workers from 6 places in this data, and Mason is 3 of them by size, with about 840 people. It is a short list. Smaller routes into the city exist below the counting threshold.
- The credit here is real but bounded. Mason allows residents about 100% of tax paid to another municipality, subject to a ceiling of about 1.12% of income, and on this pairing it is the ceiling rather than the share that binds. Blue Ash withholds $750 at about 1.25%; Mason returns $672 of that and collects the remainder of its own about 1.12% resident levy. The workplace accordingly costs $78 above the home-only position, against a total of $750.
- Blue Ash records 6 qualifying commuting origins in this dataset, of which Mason ranks 3 by worker count at approximately 840. 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
| Blue Ash takes, on income earned there | $750 |
|---|---|
| Mason charges residents | $672 |
| Less the credit Mason gives back | $672 |
| Total local tax | $750 |
| If you also lived in Blue Ash | $672 |
| Difference | $78 |
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 Mason: it may credit all of what Blue Ash 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 Mason to give any credit at all. That choice sits with the city, and cities revisit it. A vote in Mason could change what this commute to Blue Ash 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 Blue Ash, and the credit from Mason does not touch it. If your district charges one, add it to everything here.
- Do not read this as your whole tax bill. It is the part that answers to the commute between Mason and Blue Ash. State and federal tax carry on regardless, unchanged by which side of a city line your desk is on.
- Sixty thousand a year is the assumption behind the dollars. It is stated rather than measured. No wage figure exists for a place the size of Mason. The percentages are the durable part of this page, and they do not shift with what you earn in Blue Ash.
- 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. Blue Ash taxes what is earned within its boundaries, Mason taxes its residents on everything, and Mason then credits some, all or none of what Blue Ash collected. The credit is the entire mechanism, and it is set by Mason rather than by the state.
- The credit rule modeled here is Mason's own, adopted by ordinance and amendable by Mason 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 Mason can therefore change every figure on this page without anything altering in Blue Ash 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 Blue Ash, and no municipal credit applies to it. A resident of Mason 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 Mason and Blue Ash, 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 Mason to Blue Ash 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 Blue Ash costs about 1.25%; living in Mason costs about 1.12%, reduced by whatever share of the work tax the home city recognizes.
What does crossing this boundary actually cost me?
$78 a year more than if you worked where you live. It is not a commuting charge and it buys you nothing — it is what falls out of two jurisdictions both having a claim and only one of them yielding.
Is this commute common enough for the numbers to mean anything?
It is a smaller route: 840 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: Blue Ash on the basis of work location at about 1.25%, Mason on residence at about 1.12%. 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 $78 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 840 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.