🧭 Topics
Each topic is a complete guide to one subject — the rules, the arithmetic, and the vocabulary — with every calculator, document walkthrough, and defined term for that subject collected in one place. Verifiable facts with official sources, never advice, and every page ends by deferring to the agency that actually decides.
Unemployment benefits, state by state
How states turn your past wages into a weekly unemployment payment: the base period that decides which earnings count, the formula each state applies, what part-time work does to a weekly claim, and how severance interacts with a claim.
5 calculators · 4 sections · updated 2026-07-31
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Layoff money: severance, COBRA, notice and runway
The money questions a layoff triggers, in the order they arrive: what severance is worth after tax, what health coverage costs, how much notice the law required, when the last paycheck is due, and how long the whole package lasts.
8 calculators · 4 sections · updated 2026-07-31
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Taxes when you work for yourself
What changes when income arrives without withholding: self-employment tax on top of income tax, quarterly payments instead of a paycheck deduction, the safe harbor that prevents penalties, and which platform forms actually mean.
9 calculators · 4 sections · updated 2026-07-31
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Hiring someone to work in your home
When a nanny, caregiver, or housekeeper becomes your employee for tax purposes: the wage threshold that triggers Social Security and Medicare, the separate FUTA trigger, what it all costs, and what each state adds on top.
2 calculators · 4 sections · updated 2026-07-31
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What comes out of a paycheck
Why take-home pay is what it is: how employers compute federal withholding from your Form W-4, what FICA takes and when it stops, how state income tax differs, and why a bonus looks so heavily taxed.
7 calculators · 5 sections · updated 2026-07-31
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Annual update alerts — new IRS and state figures the week they drop
One email when the numbers change. Double opt-in, no spam, unsubscribe anytime.