What Is My Tax Bracket for 2024?
Understand how the 2024 federal tax brackets actually work, find your bracket, and learn why your effective rate is always lower than your bracket rate.
Tax Brackets Are Not What Most People Think
The most common misunderstanding about tax brackets is that your entire income gets taxed at your bracket rate. This is wrong, and understanding how brackets actually work can save you from making poor financial decisions based on a false assumption.
The US federal income tax system is progressive, meaning different portions of your income are taxed at different rates. Your tax bracket refers only to the rate applied to the highest dollars of your income — the marginal rate. Every dollar you earn is taxed at the rate for the bracket it falls into, not at one flat rate applied to everything you earn.
Think of it like stacking water in buckets. The first bucket has to fill before income spills into the second bucket, and so on. Each bucket has its own tax rate. Only the last bucket — the one where your highest dollars land — is at your bracket rate.
The 2024 Federal Tax Brackets Explained
For single filers in 2024, the brackets are as follows. Income up to $11,600 is taxed at 10%. Income from $11,601 to $47,150 is taxed at 12%. Income from $47,151 to $100,525 is taxed at 22%. Income from $100,526 to $191,950 is taxed at 24%. Income from $191,951 to $243,725 is taxed at 32%. Income from $243,726 to $609,350 is taxed at 35%. Income above $609,350 is taxed at 37%.
For married couples filing jointly, the brackets are roughly double the single filer thresholds. The 10% bracket covers income up to $23,200. The 12% bracket covers $23,201 to $94,300. The 22% bracket runs from $94,301 to $201,050. The 24% bracket covers up to $383,900. The thresholds continue to scale up accordingly.
These brackets apply to taxable income, not gross income. Taxable income is your gross income minus the standard deduction ($14,600 for single filers, $29,200 for married filing jointly in 2024) and any above-the-line deductions. This means many people's taxable income is significantly lower than their actual earnings.
How to Find Your Actual Bracket
Start with your total gross income from all sources — wages, freelance income, investment income, and other taxable sources. Subtract the standard deduction (or your itemized deductions if they exceed the standard deduction). The result is your taxable income.
Find the bracket range where your taxable income falls. If you are a single filer with $75,000 in taxable income, you are in the 22% bracket because $75,000 falls between $47,151 and $100,525. But only the income above $47,150 is taxed at 22%. The first $11,600 is taxed at 10%, the next $35,550 is taxed at 12%, and only the remaining income above $47,150 reaches the 22% bracket.
Your bracket is a useful shorthand for your tax situation, but it overstates your actual tax rate. The practical question is not which bracket you are in, but how much total tax you owe — which leads to the concept of your effective rate.
Why Your Effective Rate Is Always Lower Than Your Bracket
Your effective tax rate is the percentage of your total income that you actually pay in federal income taxes. Because only a portion of your income reaches your top bracket, the effective rate is always lower than the marginal rate.
Using the single filer example above with $75,000 in taxable income: the tax calculation is $1,160 on the first $11,600 at 10%, plus $4,266 on the next $35,550 at 12%, plus $6,127 on the remaining $27,850 at 22%. Total federal tax is roughly $11,553, or about 15.4% of taxable income — not 22%.
This distinction matters in practice. Some people avoid salary increases, bonuses, or additional income because they fear being pushed into a higher bracket. But a higher bracket only applies to the marginal dollars in that bracket, not to any previously taxed income. Earning more always leaves you with more money after tax, even if some of that extra money is taxed at a higher rate.