Maine Paystub Generator

Reading a Maine pay stub, line by line

A Maine pay stub carries exactly two state lines: the state income tax and, since January 2025, a small Paid Family & Medical Leave premium. There is no city tax, no unemployment deduction and no disability line. Here is what each line means in 2026:

ME State Income Tax ("ME State Tax", "ME W/H"). Maine has three brackets — 5.8%, 6.75% and 7.15% — on single-filer taxable income up to $27,400, from $27,400 to $64,850, and above $64,850 (the thresholds are inflation-indexed every year under 36 M.R.S. §5403). On your return you get a $15,700 Maine standard deduction — Maine broke with the federal $16,100 for 2026 — plus a $5,300 personal exemption; dependents are a credit, not an exemption. The deduction shrinks proportionally once Maine income passes $102,250 and is gone at $177,250. New for 2026: a 2% surcharge on taxable income over $1,000,000 (single), earmarked for PreK-12 schools.

How the withholding is computed. Your employer uses Form W-4ME (filing status, allowances, extra dollars per pay), annualizes your wages, subtracts $5,300 per allowance and a withholding standard deduction of $12,450 (single), then applies the same three brackets. Because the withholding tables build in $12,450 rather than the $15,700 you get on the return, a single filer at $60,000 is over-withheld by about $219 a year — you see it back as a refund. Bonuses and commissions paid separately are withheld at a flat 5%, below the 5.8% bottom bracket.

ME PFML ("ME PFL", "Maine Paid Leave"). Up to 0.5% of wages, on wages up to the $184,500 Social Security base — a maximum of $922.50 in 2026 (derived). Employers with 15 or more employees pay 1.0% and may deduct half from you; employers with fewer than 15 pay 0.5% and may pass all of it through. A stub showing more than 0.5% is over the statutory limit (26 M.R.S. §850-F(5)). Deductions began with pay dates on or after January 1, 2025; benefits became payable May 1, 2026. The law requires this deduction to appear on your pay statement.

What you will NOT see on a Maine stub: a local income or wage tax (no Maine city, town or county levies one); an unemployment deduction — 26 M.R.S. §1221 says contributions "may not be deducted, in whole or in part, from the wages of the employees"; a state disability (SDI/TDI) line; or a workers' compensation premium.

Plus the federal lines on every US stub: federal income tax, Social Security (6.2% up to $184,500 in 2026), and Medicare (1.45%, plus 0.9% on wages over $200,000).

Maine paycheck facts — 2026

What you actually take home in Maine (2026 estimates)

Estimated for a single filer taking the standard deduction, including federal income tax, Social Security, Medicare, Maine state tax (statutory 2026 brackets after the $15,700 standard deduction and $5,300 personal exemption) and the 0.5% ME PFML premium. There is no local tax to add:

Where the money goes at $60,000: Maine state tax $2,372 plus PFML $300 — $2,672, or 4.5% of gross. Your stub actually withholds about $2,591 in state tax (the $12,450 withholding deduction), so roughly $219 comes back at filing. Federal income tax and FICA take another 16%.

No county surprise: unlike Maryland or Pennsylvania, moving between Portland, Bangor and Rockland changes your minimum wage, not your tax — the table applies statewide.

Methodology: 2026 federal brackets and $16,100 standard deduction (IRS Rev. Proc. 2025-32), FICA per SSA, Maine 36 M.R.S. §5111 single rate schedule (2026 revision, May 20, 2026) after the $15,700 standard deduction (§5124-C) and $5,300 personal exemption, PFML at 0.5% of wages to $184,500 (26 M.R.S. §850-F). Estimates only — your withholding depends on your W-4ME allowances, employer size, credits, and pre-tax benefits.

What Maine jobs pay (BLS, May 2025)

Maine's median hourly wage across all occupations is $24.73 — 0.9% above the national median of $24.51. Maine waiters earn a $20.85 median with tips on a $7.55 cash minimum, and a Maine registered nurse at the state median ($86,990) sits in the 7.15% top bracket, where every extra dollar of pay costs 7.15 cents in state tax plus half a cent for PFML.

Maine's workforce in numbers

• 1.41 million residents, civilian labor force of 699,900, unemployment 3.1% (Census 2025 estimate; BLS, July 2026 preliminary)
• 127,173 self-employed (nonemployer) businesses (Census, 2023) — about one for every 11 residents, and 2.9 times the number of businesses with employees
• 548,469 people on employer payrolls at 43,345 establishments, earning $32 billion a year (Census County Business Patterns, 2023)
• Mean annual wage: $65,780 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)

Maine pay rules — the answers people actually need

Final paycheck: next established payday, whether you quit, were fired, or were laid off. 26 M.R.S. §626 sets one deadline for every kind of separation — wages "must be paid in full no later than the employee's next established payday." Unused vacation accrued after January 1, 2023 is wages and must be paid out, unless the employer has 10 or fewer employees, is a public employer, or a collective bargaining agreement says otherwise. If the employer loses a wage suit, you recover the unpaid wages and vacation, interest, liquidated damages of twice the unpaid amount, costs and attorney's fees.

Pay frequency: at least every 16 days on an established payday, and each check must include all wages earned to within 8 days of payday (26 M.R.S. §621-A) — one of the tightest lag rules in the country. Lengthening the interval takes 30 days' written notice; if payday lands on a day the business is closed, you are paid the next business day; and you cannot be charged a fee for direct deposit.

Is a pay stub required? Yes. 26 M.R.S. §665(1) requires a statement with every payment — check or electronic transfer — "clearly showing the date of the pay period, the hours, total earnings and itemized deductions." Records of hours and wages are kept three years, and electronic stubs must be accessible and printable by you at no cost. The Department of Labor adds that the PFML premium deduction must be shown on the statement.

Minimum wage: $15.10 from January 1, 2026 (26 M.R.S. §664), indexed to the Northeast CPI-W and rounded to the nearest five cents each January — up from $14.65 in 2025, and covering agricultural workers from 2026. Service employees who take in more than $191 a month in tips can be paid a $7.55 cash wage — exactly half the minimum — with the employer making up any shortfall. A salaried employee must earn at least $871.16 a week ($45,300.32 a year, 3,000 times the minimum wage) to be exempt from overtime.

Bonuses and commissions. When a bonus or commission is paid separately and withheld at a flat rate federally, Maine withholds a flat 5% of it — lower than the 5.8% bottom bracket, so a large bonus can leave you slightly under-withheld for the year. Withholding is not required at all if your Maine wages for the year are under $3,000.

City minimum wages above the $15.10 state floor — and no local taxes (2026)

No Maine city, town or county levies an income, wage or payroll tax. Municipalities can only exercise the taxing powers the Legislature confers (30-A M.R.S. §3001), which are limited to property and excise taxes, and the 2026 Maine Revenue Services withholding booklet has no local component. What cities can do is set a higher minimum wage, and two do:

Portland also runs its own minimum-wage ordinance above the state floor, but the city's 2026 figure could not be confirmed from a primary source at the time of writing, so it is not quoted here. Rockland's own 2026 notice puts its floor at $16.00 with an $8.00 tipped cash wage, which would make a full-time job there worth $33,280 — $1,872 more than the same job at the state rate. Treat those two numbers as unconfirmed: the city's server refused our connection and we read the notice only through a search index, so check the current rate with the city before relying on it.

Maine vs. the New England states people compare it with (only New Hampshire shares a border)

Maine's only land neighbor is New Hampshire, which taxes no wages at all — so a $60,000 earner who moves across the Piscataqua keeps about $2,670 more a year, the sum of Maine's $2,372 income tax and $300 PFML premium. Against the rest of New England the picture flips: Maine's 5.8% starting rate is higher than most, but the $15,700 deduction and $5,300 exemption shelter $21,000 before the first dollar is taxed.

(New Hampshire and Vermont figures are directional estimates pending those pages' full data workup.)

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