Yes, OASDI is absolutely the same as Social Security! OASDI stands for "Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance" - that's just the official government name for what we commonly call Social Security. For 2025, the maximum OASDI contribution is $11,780 (6.2% of the $190,000 wage base limit). Looking at your YTD of $9,342.18, you're getting pretty close! You've got about $2,438 left before hitting the cap. Once you hit that maximum, your paychecks will get noticeably bigger for the rest of the year since they'll stop taking out that 6.2% OASDI deduction. It's like getting a temporary raise during the holiday season! Your employer probably won't give you a heads up - you'll just notice when your take-home pay suddenly jumps up. Based on where you're at now, you'll likely hit the cap sometime in the next couple months. Then in January 2026, the deduction will automatically start again as the system resets for the new tax year.

Yes, OASDI is exactly the same as Social Security! OASDI stands for "Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance," which is the official name for what we commonly call Social Security. For 2025, the maximum annual OASDI contribution is $11,780 (6.2% of the $190,000 wage base limit). Based on your YTD amount of $9,342.18, you're getting close to hitting that cap - you have about $2,438 left to contribute. Once you reach that maximum, the OASDI deduction will stop appearing on your paychecks for the remainder of the year, which means you'll see a nice increase in your take-home pay (that extra 6.2%!). Most employers don't give advance notice - you'll just notice when your paycheck is suddenly larger. Given your current contribution level, you'll probably hit the cap within the next few months. It's actually a nice perk of higher earnings - those last paychecks of the year feel like bonuses when the OASDI withholding stops!

I found a free Excel template called the "Ultimate Financial Calculator" on vertex42.com that I customized for exactly this purpose. It's more work upfront to set up, but I've been using it for 3 years and it's way more accurate than any online calculator. The benefit is you can add ANY type of pre-tax deduction and see exactly how it flows through your taxes. I've modeled scenarios with 401k, HSA, dependent care FSA, transit benefits, and even some weird pre-tax legal insurance my company offers.

I've been in a similar situation and found that most calculators fall short because they don't account for the complexity of how different pre-tax deductions interact with each other and various tax rules. One approach that worked well for me was using Personal Capital's retirement planner (now Empower) in combination with a simple spreadsheet. The retirement planner helps you see the long-term impact of different contribution levels, while the spreadsheet handles the immediate paycheck impact. For the spreadsheet part, I created columns for gross pay, each type of pre-tax deduction (401k, HSA, transit, etc.), then calculated federal tax, state tax, FICA, and final take-home. The key insight was realizing that HSA contributions save you the most per dollar because they're exempt from both income tax AND FICA taxes. Also worth noting - if your company offers both traditional and Roth 401k options, you might want to split contributions. Sometimes having some post-tax savings gives you more flexibility in retirement, especially if you expect to be in a similar or higher tax bracket later. Have you checked if your company's HR department has access to more sophisticated modeling tools? Some larger employers have partnerships with financial planning services that can do exactly this kind of optimization analysis for employees.

Anyone know if the housing allowance amount gets reported anywhere on the W-2? My husband's church just verbally told him about the housing portion, but I don't see it broken out anywhere on his W-2, just a total in Box 1. Makes me wonder if they're handling it correctly.

As a tax professional who specializes in clergy taxation, I want to emphasize a few critical points that could save you significant headaches: 1. **Documentation is everything** - Make sure your wife's church provided written documentation of the housing allowance designation BEFORE January 1st. The IRS requires this to be done prospectively, not retroactively. If they didn't do this properly, the housing allowance exclusion may not be valid. 2. **Housing allowance limits** - The excludable amount is limited to the LESSER of: (a) the amount officially designated, (b) actual housing expenses, or (c) fair rental value of the home. Many people miss the "actual expenses" requirement and end up owing taxes on the excess. 3. **State taxes vary** - While the housing allowance is excluded from federal income tax, some states (like California) don't recognize this exclusion and will tax it as regular income. 4. **Quarterly payments** - Since ministers pay self-employment tax and often have large housing allowances, you may need to make quarterly estimated tax payments to avoid underpayment penalties. The IRS expects you to pay as you go, not just at year-end. Get the church's withholding corrected ASAP and consider working with a tax professional who understands clergy taxation - it's complex enough that even experienced preparers often get it wrong.

The compensation structure suggestion is actually quite dangerous from a compliance perspective. The IRS has specific guidelines for S-corp reasonable compensation, and salary amounts should be based on the actual work performed and market rates for those roles, not manipulated to achieve desired cash flow outcomes. If both partners perform similar roles and have similar responsibilities, having significantly different salaries ($55k vs $75k) without legitimate business justification could be seen as tax avoidance. The IRS could reclassify the lower salary as inadequate compensation and treat some of that partner's distributions as wages subject to payroll taxes. A safer approach would be to maintain proportional distributions as required, then use properly documented shareholder loans or capital contributions after distributions are made. This keeps you compliant with S-corp rules while achieving your goal of keeping more money in the business. I'd strongly recommend getting this strategy reviewed by a tax professional who specializes in S-corps before implementing any compensation changes.

I've been dealing with a similar situation in my S-corp and wanted to share what I learned from working with our tax attorney. The key insight is that S-corp distributions must be proportional to ownership, but there are legitimate ways to achieve your goal of keeping more money in the business while your partner takes more home. Here's what we ended up doing: Both partners take the required proportional distributions (in your case, that would be equal amounts since you're 50/50 owners). Then, after receiving your distribution, you can make a shareholder loan to the company for the amount you want to keep in the business. The critical part is proper documentation - you'll need a promissory note with market-rate interest, a realistic repayment schedule, and corporate resolutions authorizing the loan. This keeps everything above board and gives you legal recourse to get your money back. One thing to consider is that as a creditor (through the loan), you'd have different rights than if you made a capital contribution. If the business struggles, loan repayment typically has priority over distributions to shareholders. This might actually be preferable if you're concerned about protecting the money you're putting back into the business. Just make sure to work with a tax professional who understands S-corp rules - the documentation requirements are important for maintaining your S-corp status.

This sounds like a classic payroll system configuration issue that I've seen with several mid-sized companies. The fact that FICA and Medicare are being withheld correctly but federal income tax shows $0.00 suggests the problem is specifically with how your system is calculating federal withholding, not a complete failure of the tax withholding process. Given that you mention these are employees making $45-65k with standard W-4s, this is definitely not normal and they will face significant tax bills if not resolved soon. Here's what I'd recommend as immediate steps: 1. **Document the pattern**: Create a list of all affected employees with their hire dates, salary amounts, and when the zero withholding first appeared. Often these issues are tied to specific system updates or configuration changes. 2. **Request detailed calculations**: Ask your payroll provider to show you the exact step-by-step withholding calculation for 2-3 affected employees. They should be able to demonstrate how they arrive at $0.00 federal withholding. 3. **Have employees resubmit W-4s**: Even though the current forms look correct, having them fill out fresh W-4s can sometimes resolve data processing glitches. 4. **Escalate with your payroll provider**: Don't accept generic responses. Request to speak with a technical specialist who can review your system configuration, especially any recent updates or changes. Time is critical here since we're already well into 2025 - the longer this goes on, the bigger the catch-up withholding shock will be for these employees when it's finally corrected.

I've been following this thread and want to add a few technical points that might help. As someone who's dealt with similar payroll system issues, the zero federal withholding problem often stems from one of three specific technical issues: 1. **Tax table mapping errors**: Sometimes after system updates, the federal tax tables don't properly map to employee records, even though state taxes (and FICA/Medicare which use different tables) continue working normally. 2. **W-4 field parsing problems**: The 2020 W-4 redesign uses different data fields than the old allowance-based system. Some payroll systems have bugs where they misinterpret blank fields as "zero tax liability" rather than "standard withholding." 3. **Employee classification flags**: There might be a backend flag incorrectly marking these employees as exempt or non-resident, even though their visible W-4 data appears normal. For escalating with your payroll provider, ask specifically for "Tier 2 tax compliance support" and mention you need "federal withholding calculation diagnostics" rather than general troubleshooting. Use terms like "Publication 15-T calculations" and "percentage method verification" - this signals you need someone who understands the technical tax computation process. Also consider running a payroll register report for the affected employees and comparing the tax calculation details line-by-line with employees who have correct withholding. Sometimes the pattern becomes obvious when you see the raw calculation data side by side.