Clarks Summit Borough to Scranton
Pennsylvania Act 32 local earned income tax · LACKAWANNA to LACKAWANNA County · tax year 2026
Home rate
1%
Clarks Summit Borough, residents
Work rate
1%
Scranton, non-residents
You pay
1%
the higher of the two
Cost of the commute
$0
a year, above the home rate
What this commute costs you
no extra local taxThe two rates are identical, so the test is a wash — but this pair sits exactly at the line, and any rise in Scranton's commuter rate would start costing you. You pay the solid bar only — Pennsylvania charges the higher of the two rates, never their sum. Local earned income tax only; state, federal and payroll tax apply on top.
What this commute actually costs
- Good news for this commute. Working in Scranton costs you nothing extra. Clarks Summit Borough charges residents about 1%, at least as much as Scranton asks of people who work there but live elsewhere. The higher rate wins, so your home rate is simply the rate. That is $600 a year, wherever you work.
- You are on the cheapest route into Scranton. Out of 10 commutes tracked here, Clarks Summit Borough carries the lowest local rate. Colleagues traveling in from elsewhere pay more than you for the same job.
- For the Clarks Summit Borough to Scranton commute the residence governs. Clarks Summit Borough's resident rate of about 1% equals or exceeds Scranton's non-resident rate, so Pennsylvania's greater-of test resolves to the resident rate and the effective burden is about 1%, or $600 at the reference salary. The workplace adds nothing; the entire amount is remitted to the residence. This is the majority outcome and the one most commuters need confirmed.
- Clarks Summit Borough carries the lowest effective local rate across 10 routes into Scranton recorded here. The saving is attributable entirely to residence, since workplace and salary are constant across the comparison.
Where the money goes
A $75,000 salary
- Federal income tax$7,670
- Social Security and Medicare$5,738
- State income tax$2,303
- Yours$59,290
| Federal income tax10.23% | $7,670 |
|---|---|
| Social Security and Medicare7.65% | $5,738 |
| State income tax3.07% | $2,303 |
| Yours79.05% | $59,290 |
The arithmetic, side by side
| If you worked in Clarks Summit Borough | $600 |
|---|---|
| Working in Scranton | $600 |
| Difference | $0 |
On a reference salary of $60,000 a year. The local tax is flat, so every figure scales with your own pay.
What this page does not cover
- One thing worth being clear about, because it catches people out. You are not charged by both places. Clarks Summit Borough and Scranton do not add their rates together. Pennsylvania picks the higher of the two, and that is what you pay. Adding them would roughly double the bill.
- Everything here is the local earned income tax and nothing else. State income tax applies on top, as do federal tax and Social Security. None of those change when you cross a municipal line between Clarks Summit Borough and Scranton. This page is about the layer that does.
- The dollar figures use a flat reference salary of sixty thousand a year. That is a benchmark, not an average for Clarks Summit Borough. No wage data exists for single municipalities, and inventing one would be worse. Scale the numbers to your own pay. The rate for the Scranton commute is what matters, and it does not change with income.
- A postal address in Clarks Summit Borough does not prove which municipality taxes you. Boundaries and postcodes disagree often enough here that the state publishes a lookup. Philadelphia is a special case too. Its wage tax sits outside the rules that govern Scranton.
- Pennsylvania's local rule is a greater-of rule, not an additive one: the liability for a Clarks Summit Borough resident working in Scranton is the higher of the two applicable rates, not their sum. The distinction is worth stating plainly because the additive reading is intuitive and would overstate the charge by roughly a factor of two. What is divided between the municipalities is the remittance, not the worker's liability.
- Figures cover the local earned income tax exclusively. Pennsylvania's flat state income tax, federal income tax and FICA apply in addition and are invariant to the Clarks Summit Borough–Scranton municipal boundary, which is precisely why they are excluded: isolating the layer that responds to the commute is the point of the comparison.
- Dollar amounts are computed against a stated reference salary rather than a municipal wage average, which does not exist for Pennsylvania municipalities in any published source. Because the local tax is flat, the rate is invariant to income and the figures scale linearly — the Clarks Summit Borough to Scranton differential doubles at twice the salary and halves at half of it.
- Municipal taxing jurisdiction is determined by boundary rather than by postal address, and the two diverge frequently enough in Pennsylvania that the DCED lookup should be treated as authoritative for Clarks Summit Borough. Philadelphia is additionally outside this regime, administering its own wage tax on residents and non-residents under separate authority, so it does not follow the treatment described for Scranton.
Questions people ask
Do I pay local tax twice — once where I work and once where I live?
Only once, at the higher rate. Between Clarks Summit Borough's about 1% and Scranton's about 1%, the larger governs — the two are never added together.
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.
Which town's rate am I actually paying?
The one where you live. Clarks Summit Borough levies at least as much as Scranton, so its rate applies and the crossing costs you nothing extra.
Is this commute common enough for the numbers to mean anything?
520 people travel it. Volume decides whether a route gets published at all, never what the tax on it is.
Both towns charge the same — does the boundary matter at all then?
Not to your total. Clarks Summit Borough and Scranton both levy about 1%, so the amount is settled either way — what the boundary decides is which authority receives it, and that is an accounting question rather than a cost to you.
How does Pennsylvania's local earned income tax law allocate liability between two districts?
Pennsylvania's local earned income tax law assigns the higher of the residence rate (about 1%) and the non-resident work rate (about 1%); liabilities are never summed. The employer withholds at the governing rate and remits through the work district's collector, which then distributes to the residence district.
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.
Which district's rate governs on this route?
The residence rate equals or exceeds the work district's non-resident rate and therefore governs. Working outside the residence district does not increase employee liability on this route; it affects only inter-district distribution.
What is the measurement basis for a route of this size?
Route volume is 520 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.
What is the effect of identical rates either side of the boundary?
Both jurisdictions levy about 1%, so the governing rate is identical regardless of which rule allocates it. The boundary affects revenue attribution between authorities, not employee liability.