Salary Calculator

How to use this calculator

1. Enter a salary amount — any single figure you already know.
2. Choose the period it is quoted in: per hour, day, week, bi-week, semi-month, month, quarter or year.
3. Set your working year: hours per week, days per week, holidays per year and vacation days per year. The defaults are 40, 5, 10 and 15.
4. Press Calculate to fill in all eight frequencies, twice over.

The two columns, and why they differ

The same job can be described by two different annual numbers, and the difference between them is time off. The unadjusted column spreads your pay across every weekday in the year. The adjusted column takes your holidays and vacation days out first, leaving only the days you are actually paid for.

Which one matters depends on how you are paid. Paid by the hour, a day not worked is a day not earned, so the adjusted column is the honest one. On a fixed salary, your pay does not shrink in a week containing a public holiday — the salary you were quoted is the adjusted figure, and the unadjusted column tells you what that salary is worth per day of work.

That is also why the calculator reads your entry differently depending on the period you choose. An hourly or daily amount is pay for time worked, so it is taken as unadjusted. Any longer period is a salary that already covers your time off, so it is taken as adjusted.

The arithmetic

Everything is built on 52 weeks a year. Your days per week set the length of the working year, and your time off sets how much of it you are paid for:

• Weekdays in a year = 52 × days per week. On a five-day week, 260.
• Days actually worked = weekdays − holidays − vacation days. With 10 and 15, that is 235.
• Unadjusted annual = daily rate × 260. Adjusted annual = daily rate × 235.
• Every other row divides its own column's annual figure: ÷ 4 for quarterly, ÷ 12 monthly, ÷ 24 semi-monthly, ÷ 26 bi-weekly, ÷ 52 weekly.

Both columns divide by the same 260 weekdays for their daily and hourly rows. That is deliberate: the adjusted daily rate answers "what does an average day of the year earn me", which only means anything spread across the whole year. Dividing by 235 instead would simply hand back the unadjusted rate you started from.

A worked example

Take $50 an hour, 40 hours across 5 days, with 10 holidays and 15 vacation days. A day is 8 hours, so $400. The year holds 260 weekdays, of which you work 235.

Unadjusted, that is 400 × 260 = $104,000 — $8,667 a month, $4,000 bi-weekly, $2,000 a week. Adjusted, it is 400 × 235 = $94,000 — $7,833 a month, $3,615 bi-weekly, $1,808 a week, and an effective $45.19 an hour once the 25 unpaid days are spread back across the year. The $4.81 gap between $50 and $45.19 is exactly what the time off costs you.

Bi-weekly vs. semi-monthly vs. monthly

"Twice a month" and "every two weeks" are not the same thing. Bi-weekly divides by 26, the number of paychecks in a year when you are paid fortnightly. Semi-monthly (the 1st and 15th, say) pays only 24 times, so each check is larger. Monthly divides by 12. On the $94,000 adjusted figure above, that is $3,615, $3,917 and $7,833 respectively — three different numbers describing one salary.

Match it to your real schedule

The result is only as good as its assumptions. Change hours per week for overtime or part-time work, days per week for a compressed or six-day week, and the two time-off fields to whatever your contract actually gives you. Unpaid leave belongs in the vacation field too — as far as the arithmetic is concerned, an unpaid day and an unused vacation day cost the same.

Every figure here is gross pay, before income tax, payroll tax or benefits. To estimate what you actually keep, try the income tax calculator; to add up time actually worked, see the hours calculator. These are gross figures for general use, not payroll or tax advice.