Philadelphia to Bristol Borough
Pennsylvania Act 32 local earned income tax · PHILADELPHIA to BUCKS County · tax year 2026
Home rate
3.74%
Philadelphia, residents
Work rate
0.5%
Bristol Borough, non-residents
You pay
3.74%
the higher of the two
Cost of the commute
$0
a year, above the home rate
What this commute costs you
no extra local taxPhiladelphia already charges its residents more than Bristol 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
- Nothing changes for this commute. A resident of Philadelphia pays about 3.74% either way. It makes no difference whether they work at home or travel to Bristol Borough. The home rate is the higher of the two, and the higher one wins. That is $2,244 a year.
- This route is one of 3 into Bristol Borough tracked here, ranking 3 by how many people travel it. Around 651 make the trip. Seen from the other end, Bristol Borough is Philadelphia's number 51 destination of 69.
- The Philadelphia to Bristol Borough commute is tax-neutral. Philadelphia's resident rate of about 3.74% is not exceeded by Bristol Borough's non-resident rate, so under the state's rule the resident rate applies and the effective figure is about 3.74% — $2,244 annually at the reference salary. Withholding is remitted to the residence in full and the work location receives no share.
- Of 3 recorded inflows to Bristol Borough, this route ranks 3 by worker count, carrying 651 commuters from Philadelphia. Viewed from the origin it is that municipality's 51 destination of 69 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 Philadelphia | $2,244 |
|---|---|
| Working in Bristol Borough | $2,244 |
| 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
- A common worry, answered. You do not pay Philadelphia and Bristol Borough 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 Philadelphia or Bristol 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 Philadelphia. The local tax is a flat percentage. Scale every figure to your own salary and the Bristol Borough conclusion holds.
- Two practical cautions. Postal addresses and taxing boundaries do not always agree. Your post may say Philadelphia while your taxing municipality is a different one. Pennsylvania publishes an official lookup to settle it. The same caution applies at the Bristol Borough end. Philadelphia is a special case too, with its own wage tax.
- Workers commuting from Philadelphia to Bristol Borough 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 Philadelphia to Bristol 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 Philadelphia. The flat structure of the local tax means the Bristol Borough 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 Philadelphia address should be confirmed against the DCED municipal lookup before relying on the Philadelphia 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?
The rates compete rather than stack. about 3.74% where you live, about 0.5% where you work, and you pay the greater of the two.
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?
Philadelphia'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?
It is a smaller route: 651 workers. That affects how representative it is, not whether the tax arithmetic applies — the rules are the same on a quiet road as a busy one.
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 3.74%) and the non-resident work rate (about 0.5%); 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 651 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.