West Hempfield Township to East Hempfield Township
Pennsylvania Act 32 local earned income tax · LANCASTER to LANCASTER County · tax year 2026
Home rate
1%
West Hempfield Township, residents
Work rate
1%
East Hempfield Township, 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 East Hempfield Township'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 West Hempfield Township, work in East Hempfield Township, 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.
- Good position on this one. Across 5 routes into East Hempfield Township in this data, West Hempfield Township has the lowest local rate of the lot. Everyone else commuting to the same place pays more.
- Residence controls this pairing: West Hempfield Township levies about 1% on residents, at or above East Hempfield Township'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 5 inflows to East Hempfield Township tracked here, this route produces the lowest effective local rate. Local earned income tax attaches to residence and workplace rather than to the employer, so identical roles at one workplace carry different burdens and this residence sits at the favorable end.
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 West Hempfield Township | $600 |
|---|---|
| Working in East Hempfield Township | $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
- A common worry, answered. You do not pay West Hempfield Township and East Hempfield Township 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.
- Everything here is the local earned income tax and nothing else. State income tax applies on top, as do federal tax and Social Security. None of those change when you cross a municipal line between West Hempfield Township and East Hempfield Township. This page is about the layer that does.
- All the dollar amounts rest on one assumed salary. It is stated rather than measured, because nobody publishes average pay for West Hempfield Township. The local tax is a flat percentage. Scale every figure to your own salary and the East Hempfield Township conclusion holds.
- Check two things. A West Hempfield 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 East Hempfield Township.
- Workers commuting from West Hempfield Township to East Hempfield Township 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.
- Figures cover the local earned income tax exclusively. Pennsylvania's flat state income tax, federal income tax and FICA apply in addition and are invariant to the West Hempfield Township–East Hempfield Township municipal boundary, which is precisely why they are excluded: isolating the layer that responds to the commute is the point of the comparison.
- Monetary figures derive from a single stated salary assumption; no published wage series covers Pennsylvania municipalities such as West Hempfield Township. The flat structure of the local tax means the East Hempfield Township comparison is scale-invariant, so the rate difference rather than the dollar difference is the transferable result.
- Verify two things before relying on these figures. Municipal taxing boundaries do not track postal geography, so the applicable jurisdiction for a West Hempfield 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 East Hempfield Township 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% where you live, about 1% where you work, and you pay the greater of the two.
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 West Hempfield Township would.
Which town's rate am I actually paying?
The one where you live. West Hempfield Township levies at least as much as East Hempfield Township, so its rate applies and the crossing costs you nothing extra.
Is this commute common enough for the numbers to mean anything?
822 people travel it. Volume decides whether a route gets published at all, never what the tax on it is.
Both towns charge the same — does the boundary matter at all then?
Not to your total. West Hempfield Township and East Hempfield Township both levy about 1%, so the amount is settled either way — what the boundary decides is which authority receives it, and that is an accounting question rather than a cost to you.
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 measurement basis for a route of this size?
Route volume is 822 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.
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.