Sources Registry

Government sources

Five agencies and office groups supply the bulk of SalaryLabs data. Each is reviewed on the cadence noted below.

Internal Revenue Service

Federal income tax brackets, standard deductions, withholding references, and selected contribution limits.

Last reviewed: 2026

Canonical ID: https://salarylabs.site/sources/#irs

Bureau of Labor Statistics

Occupational wage estimates, wage percentiles, and inflation adjustments (CPI-U).

Last reviewed: 2026

Canonical ID: https://salarylabs.site/sources/#bls

Social Security Administration

Social Security wage base limits, contribution rates, and benefit calculations.

Last reviewed: 2026

Canonical ID: https://salarylabs.site/sources/#ssa

Department of Labor

Federal overtime rules and minimum wage standards.

Last reviewed: 2026

Canonical ID: https://salarylabs.site/sources/#dol

State Revenue and Tax Agencies

State income tax schedules, state-specific credits and deductions, and regional purchasing power adjustments.

Last reviewed: 2026

Canonical ID: https://salarylabs.site/sources/#states

What is a Sources Registry?

A canonical list of every primary source SalaryLabs references. Each source has a stable identifier (a @id) that other pages and future citation links can reference without drift.

The Sources Registry is not a marketing or partnership page. It is infrastructure: the place where SalaryLabs declares, in public and in machine-readable form, which organizations supply the numbers behind its calculators and research.

How sources are reviewed

Federal tax and FICA figures are reviewed annually when the IRS and SSA publish new tax-year guidance. Bureau of Labor Statistics releases are reviewed when the OEWS or CPI-U programs publish new data. State tax schedules are reviewed annually and updated when a state enacts significant rate changes.

Each review is logged on the relevant tool or guide page. The Methodology page documents the formulas; the Editorial policy documents sourcing standards.

Source tier system

SalaryLabs assigns each source to a tier based on publication authority and independence. Tier 1 sources are primary government publications — IRS revenue procedures, SSA wage base notices, BLS OEWS data releases. Tier 2 sources are authoritative secondary compilations — BEA regional price parities, DOL FLSA guidance. Tier 3 sources are industry estimates used only when Tier 1 or 2 data is unavailable — and they are labeled as such wherever they appear.

The tier system is not a quality hierarchy — an industry estimate from a reputable compensation research firm may be more useful for a specific comparison than a government release. It is a transparency hierarchy: you always know the publication authority behind any number on SalaryLabs.

Why primary sources matter

Most salary websites source their numbers from each other, creating citation chains where the original data point is several hops removed from the published figure. SalaryLabs goes directly to primary sources wherever possible. When a BLS wage percentile appears in a guide, the BLS OEWS data release is cited — not another website that cited BLS.

This matters because primary sources are updated on a known schedule. IRS revenue procedures are published annually in October or November. BLS OEWS data is updated each May. When these publications change, SalaryLabs can identify affected pages and update them systematically.

Calculators that use these sources

The IRS and SSA figures in these sources feed directly into every salary calculator on SalaryLabs. The Take Home Pay Calculator uses IRS federal brackets and SSA FICA rates. The Salary to Hourly Calculator uses the SSA wage base to cap FICA calculations. The Tax Estimator uses IRS revenue procedures for standard deduction amounts and bracket thresholds. The Retirement Stack Calculator uses IRS contribution limits for 401(k), IRA, and HSA.

When any of these government agencies publish updated figures, the affected calculators are reviewed and updated as part of the next weekly data refresh cycle. The Methodology page documents the exact formula used in each calculator, including which data source is used for each input.