I am an NYC resident taking a job in New Jersey. What is the tax situation per check and/or year?

Question

I was wondering what percentage of my check goes to NJ tax. Is there a difference being a nonresident of NJ.

Answer 1

Federal will tax on 100% of your income, your resident state (NY) will tax on 100% of your income minus a credit on the tax you pay to the other state (NJ). NJ will only tax on income you earn in that state.
Note: the tax you pay to other state is not on the w2 but on the NJ state return. So if you earn NJ income, you will file a NJ return, the pay check should withhold NJ tax. Now if NY tax rate is higher NJ then you should have NJ employer do a NY sympathetic withholding for you on your W2.

Answer 2

NJ tax rates range from 1.4% to 8.97% depending upon your income. About 5% is a decent guess. No tax difference for nonresidents. Main complication is having to file state returns for two states.

Answer 3

Your federal taxes will be unaffected.
As for state taxes: Your employer may be agreeable to withholding taxes for both states, which would likely grant you a refund. Generally speaking, if your employer only withholds for one state, you file a return for both states and end up getting a refund from one and owing to the other and it usually works itself out to a small or no refund.
Being in the city, you also have to deal with city taxes and depending on the borough, you could also have Borough taxes to deal with. If your employer does not withhold these for you, expect to pay in.