Middletown to Monroe
Ohio municipal income tax, Chapter 718 framework · credit set by Middletown ordinance · tax year 2026
Work city takes
2%
Monroe, on income earned there
Home city charges
2%
Middletown, residents
Credit back
$1,200
a share of the work tax
Cost of the commute
$0
a year, above working at home
What it costs you
no extra local taxMiddletown credits only part of what Monroe takes, so the remainder is taxed twice. Solid is what you pay; the faded part of the Middletown 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 Monroe costs you nothing extra in local tax. Middletown charges residents about 2%, and it credits back every dollar Monroe collects from you. Either way your bill is $1,200 a year. What changes is which city keeps the money, not how much of it you hand over.
- The numbers meet exactly here. Monroe takes the most that Middletown will hand back, down to the cent. You pay no more than you would living and working at home, but there is no cushion left in it at all.
- No other commute into Monroe is big enough to appear here, so there is nothing to rank this one against. The route from Middletown carries around 1,450 workers. Smaller streams get folded away by the counting rules rather than by the map.
- This pairing is neutral to the worker. Monroe withholds about 2% on income earned there, and Middletown, which levies about 2% on residents, credits that payment in full without reaching its own ceiling. Liability at the reference salary is therefore $1,200 — precisely what the same earnings would attract with no commute at all. What the arrangement alters is the division of revenue between Monroe and Middletown, not the sum leaving the worker's pay.
- This pairing sits exactly on its limit. Monroe's rate and the ceiling Middletown places on its credit coincide to the cent, so the credit absorbs the work-city tax precisely and not a dollar further. The commute is costless today and has no margin whatsoever: any increase by Monroe, or any reduction in the ceiling by Middletown, falls directly on the worker from the first dollar.
- Within this dataset Monroe draws a single recorded commuting flow of qualifying size — the one from Middletown, carrying roughly 1,450 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
| Monroe takes, on income earned there | $1,200 |
|---|---|
| Middletown charges residents | $1,200 |
| Less the credit Middletown gives back | $1,200 |
| Total local tax | $1,200 |
| If you also lived in Monroe | $1,200 |
| 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
- Do not add the two rates up, and do not assume the bigger one simply wins. Neither is how Ohio works. Both Monroe and Middletown charge you. Middletown may then hand back what Monroe took, or part of it, or none of it. Everything on this page turns on which of those it does.
- The credit rule on this page belongs to Middletown, not to the state. Its council sets it and its council can change it. Nothing needs to happen in Monroe or at the state level for these numbers to move. Check the current rule before you rely on it.
- 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 Middletown rather than your workplace in Monroe, and it is not credited against anything.
- Do not read this as your whole tax bill. It is the part that answers to the commute between Middletown and Monroe. State and federal tax carry on regardless, unchanged by which side of a city line your desk is on.
- 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 Monroe charges and what Middletown 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. Monroe taxes what is earned within its boundaries, Middletown taxes its residents on everything, and Middletown then credits some, all or none of what Monroe collected. The credit is the entire mechanism, and it is set by Middletown rather than by the state.
- The credit rule modeled here is Middletown's own, adopted by ordinance and amendable by Middletown 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 Middletown can therefore change every figure on this page without anything altering in Monroe 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 Monroe, and no municipal credit applies to it. A resident of Middletown 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 Middletown and Monroe, 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 Middletown to Monroe 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 Monroe costs about 2%; living in Middletown costs about 2%, 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 a common enough commute to be worth modeling?
It is. 1,450 workers travel this pair, per the federal origin-destination survey; smaller routes fall below the publication floor and get no page.
Both towns charge the same — does the boundary matter at all then?
The rates match at about 2%, so the crossing moves money between authorities rather than out of your pocket.
How does a resident credit allocate liability between two municipalities?
Both jurisdictions assert a claim: Monroe on the basis of work location at about 2%, Middletown 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.
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 basis for including this route?
Route volume is 1,450 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.
What is the effect of identical rates either side of the boundary?
Both jurisdictions levy about 2%, so the governing rate is identical regardless of which rule allocates it. The boundary affects revenue attribution between authorities, not employee liability.