How we source figures
Where every number comes from, and what happens before it goes live.
TopicDrill Editorial Editorial teamEvery figure on this site is checked against its primary source before publication, and re-checked when that source republishes.
Federal figures come from the IRS and the Social Security Administration. State tax rates come from the Tax Foundation and state revenue departments, and minimum wage from the US Department of Labor. Each figure is stored with its source URL, its effective date and a status, and only reviewed figures reach the site.
Contents
The primary sources
| What | Source |
|---|---|
| Federal brackets, standard deduction, contribution limits | IRS revenue procedures and newsroom releases |
| Social Security wage base | Social Security Administration |
| Supplemental wage withholding | IRS Publication 15 |
| State income, sales and property tax | Tax Foundation, cross-checked against state revenue departments |
| Minimum wage | US Department of Labor, state labor departments |
Where a secondary source such as the Tax Foundation is used, it is because it publishes a consistent comparison across all fifty states that no single primary source provides. The primary source remains the authority, and it is what a disagreement is resolved against.
How a figure is stored
Every figure is a row, not a sentence in an article. Each row holds the value, the tax year, the effective date, the source URL, the source label and a status. Nothing is typed into prose where it could drift out of date unnoticed.
A figure has one of three statuses:
- Draft. Entered, not yet checked. Never appears on the site or in a calculator.
- Live. Checked against the primary source by a named reviewer. This is what the site renders.
- Retired. Superseded, kept for the record.
Editing a live figure returns it to draft, because an edited number has not been reviewed.
When figures change
Most change on 1 January, when new tax years and state minimum wages take effect. A smaller group, including some Oregon and California city rates, change on 1 July. We re-check a figure whenever its source republishes, and every page shows when it was last updated.
What we do not do
We do not estimate. Where a bracket table is not published in our data set, the calculators say so and decline to produce a number rather than approximating one from a top marginal rate. An estimate presented as a figure is worse than no figure.
We do not use AI to generate figures. Content may be drafted with assistance, but no number reaches the site without a human checking it against the source.
Corrections
When a figure is wrong we fix it, note the correction on the page and date it. See our corrections policy.
Every figure on this page is attributed to a named source with the date it took effect. Our reviewers check them against the primary source before publication.
About our expert
Editorial team
Experience
We publish nothing without a source. Every rate, threshold and limit on this site is attributed to the IRS, the SSA, the Department of Labor or a state revenue department, with the date that figure took effect recorded alongside it.
When a source republishes, the figure is re-checked and the page's updated date moves. Where a number is disputed or varies by locality, we say so on the page rather than picking one and hoping.
Areas of expertise
- Federal tax
- State tax
- Payroll
- Small business
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