Kansas Minimum Wage 2026

The Kansas minimum wage in 2026

Kansas sets a minimum wage of $7.25 an hour, the same as the federal floor. That is what a covered employer must pay, and it is 37th of the 51 jurisdictions in the country. Full time at $7.25 — 2,080 hours a year — is $15,080 of gross pay.

That figure is what the employer pays, not what arrives. After federal income tax and FICA and Kansas income tax, a single filer working 80 hours a fortnight at $7.25 takes home $531.00 per paycheck and $13,806 over the year — the calculator above has the exact breakdown, and you can change the hours to match what you actually work.

What $7.25 an hour leaves after tax

At this wage the federal income tax is small — the $16,100 standard deduction covers most of a $15,080 salary — so the tax that bites is FICA: 7.65% from the first dollar, $44.37 of each paycheck and $1,154 a year, with no deduction and no form that changes it. Federal withholding takes $0.00 and Kansas $4.63. Whether any of the federal withholding comes back depends on credits the paycheck cannot see: the earned income credit is worth several thousand dollars at this income for a worker with children, and it arrives only on the return.

The table compares the wage floor with the rates just above it, because the practical question at the bottom of the labour market is what an extra dollar or two an hour is worth after tax.

Tipped work in Kansas

Kansas allows a tip credit, so an employer may count tips toward the minimum wage and pay a lower cash wage, provided the cash wage plus tips reaches $7.25 an hour in every pay period and the employer makes up any shortfall. The federal floor for the cash wage is $2.13; the state's own tipped cash wage is the figure to check with the Kansas labour department, and it is being read one state at a time before it is published here. Whatever the cash wage, the tax on the tips is withheld from it, which is why a tipped paycheck can read close to zero on a good week.

From 2026 the first $25,000 of reported tips is deductible from federal taxable income for occupations that customarily receive them — at filing, not on the paycheck, and it does not touch FICA. The tip calculator works the cash paycheck, the employer top-up and the deduction; the guide to the new deductions explains what the law did and did not do.

Overtime at the minimum wage

Overtime is one and a half times the regular rate after 40 hours in a workweek, so at $7.25 the overtime rate is $10.88. Ten overtime hours in a fortnight take the gross from $580.00 to $688.75 and the take-home from $531.00 to $618.82: $87.82 more in the account for $108.75 more of gross, 80.8% of it surviving. The premium half — $36 of that fortnight — is deductible from federal taxable income from 2026, up to $12,500 a year, which at this wage is more overtime than anyone should be working. The overtime calculator applies Kansas's rule, including the daily thresholds where the state has them.

What $15,080 a year buys in Kansas

Prices are 9.9% below the national average in Kansas, by the Bureau of Economic Analysis regional price parity, so the $7.25 floor is worth about $8.05 in national purchasing power — more than the sticker figure. Housing, which moves far more than the general index, is 28.8% below the national level here. That is the honest way to compare a minimum wage across states: a higher floor in a dear state can buy less than a lower floor in a cheap one.

Against rent, the common benchmark is that housing should take no more than 30% of gross: $377 a month at this wage. Whether that rents anything in Kansas is a question this site will not pretend to answer from a national dataset; the point of the figure is to make the gap visible.

Cities and counties that set their own floor

A city or county may set a minimum wage above the state's, and where it does, the local figure applies inside its boundary. Local minimum wages are less common in Kansas, but the city or county is always worth checking before assuming the state figure. This page carries the state and federal figures only; local ordinances are being read one by one and are not published here until they are.

Where this sits nationally

31 of the 51 jurisdictions are above the federal floor and 20 are at it or without a law of their own. The federal minimum has been $7.25 since 24 July 2009, the longest period without an increase since the law was written in 1938; its purchasing power has fallen by roughly a third over that time, which is why states and cities have become the place where the floor actually moves. The highest jurisdiction is District of Columbia at $18.40; the hub page ranks all 51 and lets you compare any two after tax.

The three taxes on a paycheck, and why they behave differently

Federal income tax is progressive and starts from zero: the first $16,100 a single filer earns in 2026 is untaxed because that is the standard deduction, and the rate then climbs through seven brackets from 10% to 37%. It is the only line your W-4 changes. FICA is flat from the first dollar — 6.2% for Social Security up to $184,500 of wages and 1.45% for Medicare without limit — and no form changes it. State income tax is whatever your state decided: nothing in 9 states, one flat rate in 13, brackets in the other 29, and 11 states let a city or county add a line of their own.

On the $580.00 biweekly example above: $0.00 of federal withholding, $44.37 of FICA and $4.63 of Kansas tax. Keeping them on separate lines is the point: a 401(k) contribution moves the first and third but not the second; a raise moves all three at different rates; the Social Security cap moves only the second. A single «taxes» figure hides which lever does what.

Pay frequency changes the number, not the pay

$15,080 a year is $290.00 a week, $580.00 every two weeks, $628.33 twice a month and $1,256.67 a month. Nothing about the tax changes, only the slice you see on payday — but the slice is what people budget from, and biweekly and semi-monthly are the pair that get confused: the biweekly paycheck is about 7.7% smaller, and in return two months a year contain three of them.

Frequency also affects withholding precision, because the IRS percentage method annualises each paycheck on its own. A monthly paycheck with a bonus in it is annualised twelve times over, a weekly one fifty-two times, which is why bonuses are usually withheld separately at a flat rate. Some years have 27 biweekly or 53 weekly paydays; the advanced panel of the paycheck calculator has both, because payroll software does.

What changed in 2026

The standard deduction is $16,100 single, $32,200 joint and $24,150 head of household; every bracket threshold moved up with inflation; the Social Security wage base is $184,500; the 401(k) elective limit is $24,500. Each is read from the document that sets it — IRS Revenue Procedure 2025-32, the SSA's contribution and benefit base, IRS Notice 2025-67 — and listed with its source under the calculator.

The bigger change is the set of new federal deductions: qualified overtime premium pay up to $12,500 ($25,000 joint), reported tips up to $25,000, and $6,000 more for each person aged 65 or over, all phasing out above $150,000 of income. None of them changes what an employer withholds, because Publication 15-T does not know about them; they reduce the tax owed at filing, which is why the calculators on this site show them in the «withholding vs what you owe» box rather than on the paycheck. The what changed in 2026 guide keeps the dated list, including state changes.

A worked example: $15,080 in Kansas, paid every two weeks

Take $15,080 a year in Kansas, paid every two weeks (26 paychecks), single, standard W-4, no pre-tax deductions. The gross per paycheck is $580.00. Federal income tax withholding, from the 2026 Publication 15-T percentage method, takes $0.00. Social Security takes 6.2% of gross, $35.96, and Medicare 1.45%, $8.41. Kansas withholds $4.63 under its brackets and deductions. The net deposit is $531.00, 91.6% of gross; over the year that is $13,806 from $15,080, an effective rate of 8.4% on all taxes together. Every line is reproducible from the documents on the sources page, and the table below lists them in the order they appear on a stub.

Two things on that stub are not obvious from the totals. First, the federal line is withholding, not tax: the tables annualise this paycheck as if all 26 were identical, and the year's actual tax, $0, differs from the $0 withheld by $0, which becomes a refund in April. Second, Social Security and Medicare are the same fraction of every paycheck of the year, because the salary is under the wage base, and no form can change them; only Section 125 deductions reduce their base. The reading guide walks each line and names what it should equal.

Nearby hourly rates at 80 hours per two weeks

A dollar an hour more or less changes the every two weeks paycheck by about $80.00 gross and somewhat less net. The ladder below runs the same hours at rates from $7.25 to $17.25 in Kansas; the hourly to salary converter turns any rate into a year and the hourly calculator adds overtime and tips.

Nearby salaries: what $25,080 to $50,080 leave in Kansas

A raise or a job offer is rarely at the round number on this page, so here is the ladder around it: the same every two weeks paycheck at 3 salaries from $25,080 to $50,080, single, standard W-4, no deductions. The effective rate climbs from 13.8% to 19.3% across the range because federal income tax is progressive while FICA is flat; each extra $10,000 of salary leaves less than the last, and the pay raise calculator prices any step exactly. The salary after tax pages carry the full range, one page per amount.

Reading the ladder the other way answers the interview question: to take home $10,000 more a year in Kansas takes a raise of roughly $12,389 in gross at this level, because the new dollars are taxed at the marginal rate rather than the average. The state column grows faster than the salary, since Kansas's brackets rise with income; the FICA column grows in a straight line until the wage base. The gross-up calculator runs the reverse computation for any net.

The same paycheck under each filing status

Filing status is the one W-4 line everyone fills in, and it moves the federal line more than most people expect. On $15,080 in Kansas, paid every two weeks, a single filer is withheld $0.00 per paycheck; married filing jointly (one income) $0.00, because the joint table doubles the standard deduction to $32,200 and widens every bracket; head of household $0.00, with its $24,150 deduction and its own brackets. Married filing separately uses the single table. Kansas's own deductions and brackets follow the state’s own joint schedule, which is why the state column moves too. Picking «married» with two incomes and skipping step 2 is the commonest cause of an April bill; the W-4 guide covers the choice.

The last column shows why the status matters beyond the paycheck: the year's federal income tax on $15,080 is $0 single and $0 married filing jointly on one income, a difference of $0 that the W-4 status either delivers through the year or holds back for a refund. Head of household is the status most often missed by single parents, who leave $0 a year on the single table. FICA is identical in every row, since it has no status.

The whole year on $15,080: withholding, tax due, and the settlement

26 paychecks of $580.00 withhold $0 of federal income tax over 2026. The tax actually due on the return, with the $16,100 standard deduction and no credits, is $0, so the year ends with a refund of about $0 — the gap between the withholding tables' approximation and the exact computation. The marginal rate on the last dollar is 10%; the effective rate on all taxes together is 8.4%. Social Security applies to every paycheck of the year, because $15,080 is under the $184,500 wage base. The 2026 deductions for overtime premium and tips apply at filing to anyone with qualifying pay; they do not change these paychecks. Kansas takes $120 for the year, 0.8% of salary.

Refund or bill: what the year settles

Withholding is a prepayment; the return computes the tax and returns or collects the difference. On $15,080 with these settings the year withholds $0 against $0 due, so the settlement is a refund of about $0. A refund is money lent to the Treasury at no interest for up to sixteen months; a bill is fine up to a point and penalised beyond it. The point is the safe harbour: withholding of at least 90% of this year's tax ($0 here) or 100% of last year's (110% above $150,000 of income) avoids the underpayment penalty, which is interest on each quarter's shortfall. These paychecks clear the 90% harbour on their own.

What makes the settlement move: credits the W-4 does not carry (the earned income credit, education credits, the 2026 overtime and tip deductions), which enlarge the refund; a second income, other income, or too many dependents on the form, which produce the bill; a bonus withheld at the flat 22% when the marginal rate is 10%, which over-withholds at this salary; and a change of job or a partial year, which annualises each paycheck wrongly. The W-4 fixer sets the lines that bring the settlement to zero, or to a chosen refund.

What deductions do to this paycheck

Deductions are where the same salary produces different paychecks. A 6% traditional 401(k) contribution — $34.80 per paycheck on $15,080, well under the $24,500 annual limit — reduces federal and state taxable wages but not FICA wages, so it costs $32.99 of take-home rather than its face value. A $150 Section 125 deduction for health premiums or an HSA reduces every base including FICA, and costs $133.90. A Roth contribution of the same 6% comes out after tax and costs the full amount now in exchange for tax-free withdrawals later. The table gives each case for this paycheck; the pre-tax deductions calculator runs any amount and the 401(k) calculator draws the whole curve.

The order matters on the stub as well as in the arithmetic. Section 125 items come off first and reduce the FICA wages line, which is why a health premium lowers the Social Security and Medicare figures by 7.65% of itself; the 401(k) comes off next and reduces federal taxable wages only. Both appear in the W-2: box 1 (federal wages) is gross minus both, boxes 3 and 5 (Social Security and Medicare wages) are gross minus the Section 125 items alone. An employer match, where there is one, is added on top of the contribution and never touches the paycheck; the compare two jobs tool values it.

What each W-4 line does to this paycheck

The federal line is the only tax on the stub that a form can change, and each step of the W-4 moves it by a predictable amount. One qualifying child on step 3 lowers withholding by $84.62 per paycheck — the $2,200 credit spread over 26 paychecks — taking the net to $531.00. Checking box 2(c) for a second job raises it by $27.68, because the checkbox table halves the brackets so that each job is withheld as if it earned half the household income. Extra withholding on 4(c) is dollar for dollar. Other income on 4(a) adds the tax on it at the marginal rate; deductions on 4(b) remove it. The table runs each case for $15,080 in Kansas; the W-4 fixer computes the combination that makes the year's withholding equal the year's tax.

None of these lines changes the tax; they change when it is paid. Claiming a child that is not yours on step 3, or deductions you will not take on 4(b), enlarges every paycheck and produces the same amount plus a penalty in April. The lawful levers are the ones you are entitled to — the children you have, the deductions you will itemise, the second income you must account for — and the fixer applies exactly those. A new W-4 takes effect from the next payroll run after your employer receives it, and the year-to-date withholding already taken is not recomputed.

$15,080 in Kansas against nine other states

Federal tax and FICA are the same everywhere; the state line is what moves. On $15,080 paid every two weeks, the nine states with no wage tax leave $535.63 per paycheck; California leaves $535.63, $0.00 less, or $0 over the year. Flat-rate states sit in between and their rate is the whole story; bracket states depend on the salary. Prices move more than taxes between most of these states, and the state pages carry the BEA price index beside the take-home; the state ranking sorts all 51 for any salary.

Two cautions before reading the table as a moving guide. The state taxes wages where the work is done, with the resident state taxing everything and crediting the work state, so a remote job does not change the column unless you change where you live — and five states apply a «convenience of the employer» rule that keeps taxing remote work done elsewhere. And the no-tax states collect the difference elsewhere: property tax in Texas and New Hampshire, sales tax in Tennessee and Washington. The no-income-tax guide and the local taxes guide cover both.

Common mistakes

Assuming the state figure is what you must be paid. The highest of the federal, state and local floors applies. Reading a tipped cash wage as the whole wage. Tips must bring it to the full minimum, and the employer covers any shortfall. Treating the annual figure as take-home. At $7.25, FICA alone takes $1,154 a year.

Reading the flat 22% on a bonus as the tax on it. It is withholding; the tax is your marginal rate. Budgeting from the wrong paycheck: biweekly and semi-monthly differ by about 7.7%. Claiming the same child on two W-4s, which under-withholds the household by the credit. Assuming a raise can push you into a bracket that leaves you worse off — in a progressive system it cannot. Forgetting the Social Security cap: above $184,500 the later paychecks are larger, and a budget built on January's paycheck is too tight for December's.