One thing to remember with the paycheck calculator is that health care, dental, vision, and most insurance that you buy through your employer is usually exempt from Federal, FICA, State, and Local taxes.
Good for you for funding an IRA. Assuming you are in your early 20s, you should save at least 10% of your income towards retirement. The usual rules are
-fund 401k to max out employer matching
-fund IRA
-if necessary to reach percentage goal, increase 401k percentage
Since your matching is not starting for 9 months, your plan sounds good.
Also look at your projected tax bracket. If you are single you can have taxable income up to $32550 and still be in the 15% tax bracket. You may want to consider a traditional IRA for this year if funding it would keep you in the 15% bracket, since you won't be making any 401k contributions this year. If you are not close to the cutoff you probably should do a Roth IRA.
Last edited by noppenbd : 03-26-2008 at 02:06 PM.
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