East Hempfield Township to Lancaster
Pennsylvania Act 32 local earned income tax · LANCASTER to LANCASTER County · tax year 2026
Home rate
1%
East Hempfield Township, residents
Work rate
1%
Lancaster, 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 Lancaster'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
- Live in East Hempfield Township, work in Lancaster, and your local tax is your home rate: about 1%. That is $600 a year on a sixty-thousand salary. The work location adds nothing. Pennsylvania charges whichever rate is higher, and yours already is.
- This route is one of 8 into Lancaster tracked here, ranking 3 by how many people travel it. Around 1,431 make the trip. Seen from the other end, Lancaster is East Hempfield Township's number 1 destination of 2.
- Residence controls this pairing: East Hempfield Township levies about 1% on residents, at or above Lancaster's non-resident rate, so the outcome is the resident rate — about 1%, or $600 at the reference salary. Employers still withhold against the work location's collector, but the amount is unchanged and the residence is the ultimate recipient.
- Of 8 recorded inflows to Lancaster, this route ranks 3 by worker count, carrying 1,431 commuters from East Hempfield Township. Viewed from the origin it is that municipality's 1 destination of 2 recorded — neither the largest catchment nor a marginal one.
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 East Hempfield Township | $600 |
|---|---|
| Working in Lancaster | $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
- To be explicit, since the arrangement invites confusion. The rates for East Hempfield Township and Lancaster are not stacked. Pennsylvania takes the larger one. What is collected then gets divided between the two municipalities. That division does not change what comes out of your pay.
- This covers the local tax only. Whatever East Hempfield Township or Lancaster takes sits on top of state tax, federal tax and Social Security. Those three do not care where you live or work.
- All the dollar amounts rest on one assumed salary. It is stated rather than measured, because nobody publishes average pay for East Hempfield Township. The local tax is a flat percentage. Scale every figure to your own salary and the Lancaster conclusion holds.
- Two practical cautions. Postal addresses and taxing boundaries do not always agree. Your post may say East Hempfield Township while your taxing municipality is a different one. Pennsylvania publishes an official lookup to settle it. The same caution applies at the Lancaster end. Philadelphia is a special case too, with its own wage tax.
- The two rates applicable to a East Hempfield Township–Lancaster commute are alternatives, not addends. The statute fixes the employee's liability at the greater of them and then apportions the proceeds, with the residence receiving up to its own rate and the excess passing to the work location. The apportionment is fiscally significant to the municipalities and immaterial to the worker.
- Only the local earned income tax component is modeled for the East Hempfield Township to Lancaster commute. State and federal liabilities are constant across Pennsylvania municipalities and are excluded so the municipal differential is visible rather than buried inside a larger total.
- Monetary figures derive from a single stated salary assumption; no published wage series covers Pennsylvania municipalities such as East Hempfield Township. The flat structure of the local tax means the Lancaster comparison is scale-invariant, so the rate difference rather than the dollar difference is the transferable result.
- Two caveats bear on accuracy. First, postal addresses and municipal taxing boundaries diverge frequently in Pennsylvania, so a East Hempfield Township address should be confirmed against the DCED municipal lookup before relying on the East Hempfield Township rate. Second, Philadelphia administers its wage tax outside this framework, with its own resident and non-resident rates and its own credit arrangements, so any pairing touching it should be checked against the city's own schedule.
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 East Hempfield Township's about 1% and Lancaster's about 1%, the larger governs — the two are never added together.
Does working in a different town cost me anything?
Nothing extra. The tax is redirected rather than increased, so this particular crossing costs you no more than working in East Hempfield Township would.
Which town's rate am I actually paying?
East Hempfield Township sets it. Your residence rate is the larger, so it governs regardless of where the job is.
Is this a common enough commute to be worth modeling?
Yes — 1,431 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.
Both towns charge the same — does the boundary matter at all then?
Not for what you pay. Both sides charge about 1%; the line only determines who banks it.
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 basis for including this route?
Route volume is 1,431 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 1%, so the governing rate is identical regardless of which rule allocates it. The boundary affects revenue attribution between authorities, not employee liability.