Fairview Township to Erie
Pennsylvania Act 32 local earned income tax · YORK to ERIE County · tax year 2026
Home rate
1.45%
Fairview Township, residents
Work rate
1.65%
Erie, non-residents
You pay
1.65%
the higher of the two
Cost of the commute
$120
a year, above the home rate
What this commute costs you
workplace governsErie charges commuters more than Fairview Township charges its own residents, so the work rate wins the greater-of test and the difference is real money. 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
- This commute costs money. Work locally and Fairview Township would charge you about 1.45%. But Erie charges non-residents about 1.65%, and the higher rate applies. The difference is $120 a year, for a decision about where the office is.
- This route is one of 10 into Erie tracked here, ranking 3 by how many people travel it. Around 1,040 make the trip. Seen from the other end, Erie is Fairview Township's number 1 destination of 3.
- The Fairview Township to Erie pairing produces a workplace-driven liability. Against a resident rate of about 1.45%, Erie's non-resident rate of about 1.65% is higher and therefore controls, giving about 1.65% and $990 annually. The workplace-attributable increment is $120. Workers frequently discover this only through withholding rather than in advance.
- Of 10 recorded inflows to Erie, this route ranks 3 by worker count, carrying 1,040 commuters from Fairview Township. Viewed from the origin it is that municipality's 1 destination of 3 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 Fairview Township | $870 |
|---|---|
| Working in Erie | $990 |
| Difference | $120 |
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
- A common worry, answered. You do not pay Fairview Township and Erie both. Only one rate applies, the higher of the two. The two councils then sort out between themselves who gets what, and your bill is unaffected.
- This covers the local tax only. Whatever Fairview Township or Erie takes sits on top of state tax, federal tax and Social Security. Those three do not care where you live or work.
- Sixty thousand a year is a benchmark. It is not a guess at what people in Fairview Township earn. No published wage figure exists for single municipalities. The rate is the durable part of this page. The dollars scale straight up and down with whatever you earn in Erie.
- Check two things. A Fairview Township postal address may not match your taxing municipality. That catches out plenty of people near a boundary, and the state has an official lookup for it. Philadelphia is the other one to watch. It runs its wage tax separately, outside the pattern used for Erie.
- Workers commuting from Fairview Township to Erie are subject to one rate, not two. The statute directs the employer to withhold the greater of the resident and non-resident rates; the allocation between the two taxing bodies is a remittance mechanic invisible to the employee. Treating the two rates as cumulative is the most common misreading of the statute.
- Only the local earned income tax component is modeled for the Fairview Township to Erie 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.
- The reference salary is a stated benchmark, not an estimate of Fairview Township earnings, for which no municipal-level published source exists. The local earned income tax is proportional, so all dollar figures for the Erie commute scale linearly with income and the rate comparison holds at every salary.
- Verify two things before relying on these figures. Municipal taxing boundaries do not track postal geography, so the applicable jurisdiction for a Fairview Township address should be confirmed through the state's official lookup. Separately, Philadelphia's wage tax operates outside this framework and is not governed by the greater-of rule applied here, which affects any pairing involving the city rather than Erie generally.
Questions people ask
Do I pay local tax twice — once where I work and once where I live?
The rates compete rather than stack. about 1.45% where you live, about 1.65% where you work, and you pay the greater of the two.
What does crossing this boundary actually cost me?
$120 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.
Which town's rate am I actually paying?
Erie's, because it is the higher of the two. Where you work sets the rate on this route, and your home town receives its share out of what is collected rather than charging you separately.
Is this a common enough commute to be worth modeling?
Yes — 1,040 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 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 1.45%) and the non-resident work rate (about 1.65%); 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.
What is the marginal local tax cost of this commute?
Marginal annual liability attributable to working outside the residence jurisdiction is $120 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.
Which district's rate governs on this route?
The work district's non-resident rate exceeds the residence rate and therefore governs. Withholding occurs at that rate, and distribution between the two districts happens after collection without further employee liability.
What is the basis for including this route?
Route volume is 1,040 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.