Ferguson Township to State College Borough
Pennsylvania Act 32 local earned income tax · CENTRE to CENTRE County · tax year 2026
Home rate
2.35%
Ferguson Township, residents
Work rate
1%
State College Borough, non-residents
You pay
2.35%
the higher of the two
Cost of the commute
$0
a year, above the home rate
What this commute costs you
no extra local taxFerguson Township already charges its residents more than State College Borough charges commuters, so the home rate governs and the job adds nothing at all. 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 State College Borough costs you nothing extra. Ferguson Township charges residents about 2.35%, at least as much as State College Borough asks of people who work there but live elsewhere. The higher rate wins, so your home rate is simply the rate. That is $1,410 a year, wherever you work.
- This is one of 2 places Ferguson Township residents commute to, ranking 2 by size. Few routes into State College Borough are recorded, so there is little to compare at that end.
- For the Ferguson Township to State College Borough commute the residence governs. Ferguson Township's resident rate of about 2.35% equals or exceeds State College Borough's non-resident rate, so Pennsylvania's greater-of test resolves to the resident rate and the effective burden is about 2.35%, or $1,410 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.
- Among 2 destinations recorded for Ferguson Township, State College Borough ranks 2 by worker count. The destination side carries too few recorded inflows for a meaningful comparison across origins, so the origin-side position is the more informative one here.
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 Ferguson Township | $1,410 |
|---|---|
| Working in State College Borough | $1,410 |
| 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 Ferguson Township and State College Borough 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 Ferguson Township or State College Borough 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 Ferguson Township. The local tax is a flat percentage. Scale every figure to your own salary and the State College Borough conclusion holds.
- A postal address in Ferguson Township 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 State College Borough.
- The two rates applicable to a Ferguson Township–State College Borough 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 Ferguson Township to State College Borough 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 Ferguson Township. The flat structure of the local tax means the State College Borough comparison is scale-invariant, so the rate difference rather than the dollar difference is the transferable result.
- 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 Ferguson Township. 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 State College Borough.
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 Ferguson Township's about 2.35% and State College Borough'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?
Ferguson Township's, because it is the higher of the two. Where you live sets the rate on this route, so working across the boundary does not raise what you owe — it only changes who collects it.
Is this commute common enough for the numbers to mean anything?
508 workers make this journey — enough to be published, but not a major corridor. The tax rules do not depend on how many people travel a route, so the figures hold regardless; the count only tells you how typical this pairing is.
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 2.35%) 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 508 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.