Читать книгу Social Security For Dummies - Peterson Jonathan, Jonathan Peterson - Страница 21

If you’re a wage earner, you pay into the Social Security system straight out of your paycheck. This payroll tax is dubbed “FICA,” which stands for the Federal Insurance Contributions Act. The Social Security portion of your payroll tax is typically 6.2 percent of earnings up to a certain amount, which is adjusted annually (for 2020, the cap was set at $137,700). Employers also pay 6.2 percent for each employee. In addition, workers and their employers each pay 1.45 percent of all earnings for Medicare’s Hospital Insurance Trust Fund. As of January 2013, individuals who earn more than $200,000 ($250,000 for married couples filing jointly) pay an additional 0.9 percent in Medicare taxes.

If you’re self-employed, you’re on the hook for both the employee and employer share, which usually adds up to 12.4 percent for Social Security and 2.9 percent for Medicare. This tax is dubbed “SECA,” for the Self-Employed Contributions Act.

Politicians have been willing to ease the payroll-tax burden in response to economic conditions. In 2011, Congress approved a “payroll-tax holiday” to boost the economy; it lowered the worker’s tax rate to 4.2 percent instead of the usual 6.2 percent. Employers still paid the usual 6.2 percent. The self-employed paid an overall rate of 10.4 percent. (The payroll-tax holiday expired at the end of 2012.)

Most workers pay Social Security taxes on all their earnings, because most workers don’t earn above the cap for Social Security payroll taxes. Well more than half — maybe three-quarters — of U.S. households pay more in Social Security taxes than in federal income taxes. Although no one enjoys paying taxes, people tend to accept the Social Security tax because it enables them to earn important benefits.