Hampden Township to Susquehanna Township
Pennsylvania Act 32 local earned income tax · CUMBERLAND to CAMBRIA County · tax year 2026
Home rate
1.6%
Hampden Township, residents
Work rate
1%
Susquehanna Township, non-residents
You pay
1.6%
the higher of the two
Cost of the commute
$0
a year, above the home rate
What this commute costs you
no extra local taxHampden Township already charges its residents more than Susquehanna Township 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 Susquehanna Township costs you nothing extra. Hampden Township charges residents about 1.6%, at least as much as Susquehanna Township asks of people who work there but live elsewhere. The higher rate wins, so your home rate is simply the rate. That is $960 a year, wherever you work.
- You are on the cheapest route into Susquehanna Township. Out of 3 commutes tracked here, Hampden Township carries the lowest local rate. Colleagues traveling in from elsewhere pay more than you for the same job.
- For the Hampden Township to Susquehanna Township commute the residence governs. Hampden Township's resident rate of about 1.6% equals or exceeds Susquehanna Township's non-resident rate, so Pennsylvania's greater-of test resolves to the resident rate and the effective burden is about 1.6%, or $960 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.
- Hampden Township carries the lowest effective local rate across 3 routes into Susquehanna Township 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 Hampden Township | $960 |
|---|---|
| Working in Susquehanna Township | $960 |
| 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. Hampden Township and Susquehanna Township 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.
- This covers the local tax only. Whatever Hampden Township or Susquehanna Township takes sits on top of state tax, federal tax and Social Security. Those three do not care where you live or work.
- The dollar figures use a flat reference salary of sixty thousand a year. That is a benchmark, not an average for Hampden Township. No wage data exists for single municipalities, and inventing one would be worse. Scale the numbers to your own pay. The rate for the Susquehanna Township commute is what matters, and it does not change with income.
- A postal address in Hampden 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 Susquehanna Township.
- Pennsylvania's local rule is a greater-of rule, not an additive one: the liability for a Hampden Township resident working in Susquehanna Township 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.
- Only the local earned income tax component is modeled for the Hampden Township to Susquehanna Township 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.
- 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 Hampden Township to Susquehanna Township 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 Hampden 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 Susquehanna Township.
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 Hampden Township's about 1.6% and Susquehanna Township'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. Hampden Township levies at least as much as Susquehanna Township, so its rate applies and the crossing costs you nothing extra.
Is this commute common enough for the numbers to mean anything?
607 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 1.6%) 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 607 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.