Form W-2: wage and tax statement What the form reports.

Form W-2, Wage and Tax Statement

A Form W-2 is the wage and tax statement an employer prepares for an employee. The Social Security Administration is the agency that receives Copy A. The employee receives copies to keep and to attach or retain with a federal return when the IRS instructions say a copy is needed. This page describes the boxes on the form in the order a person usually reads them. It does not compute a refund and it does not tell anyone whether a return is required. The controlling text is the IRS General Instructions for Forms W-2 and W-3, published at the address below.

Official instructions: https://www.irs.gov/instructions/iw2w3

What the paper is for

Employers use Form W-2 to report wages and the taxes withheld from those wages for a calendar year. The form also carries a set of codes for items that are not simply cash wages, such as elective deferrals into a retirement plan. Each box has a printed label. The label is the IRS name for that line. If a box is blank, the instructions are the place to learn whether a blank means zero, not applicable, or something the employer was not required to complete. Do not infer a legal result from a blank box on this page.

The form has several copies. They are not interchangeable. Copy A goes to the Social Security Administration and is the copy printed in a special red ink on the official form. Copy 1 is for the state, city, or local tax department when that department participates. Copies B, C, and 2 are the copies associated with the employee: the federal return copy, the employee's record, and the state or local return copy. Copy D stays with the employer. When a person asks "which copy do I keep," the answer on the form itself is the copy marked as the employee's record. This site does not replace that marking.

The employer, not the employee, is the filer of Copy A. An employee who thinks a box is wrong generally asks the employer for a corrected form, Form W-2c, which the same instruction booklet describes. A corrected form is a new statement. It is not an amended individual return. Those are different documents, described in different IRS publications.

Box 1 and box 2

Box 1 is labeled wages, tips, and other compensation. The instructions explain which payments are included and which pretax amounts are left out. The figure in the box is the employer's report of that total for the year. It is not, by itself, the tax due and it is not a refund. People often compare box 1 with the last pay stub of the year. Differences can come from items the instructions list, including elective deferrals and other pretax benefits. The comparison is a reading aid. It is not a determination that either number is wrong.

Box 2 is federal income tax withheld. It is the amount the employer reports as withheld and deposited as federal income tax for that employee. Withholding is a prepayment mechanism described in the employer's publication, Publication 15, which the W-2 instructions point toward. Box 2 does not state the tax on the return. The return is a separate form. This page will not subtract box 2 from anything.

Social security and Medicare boxes

Box 3 is social security wages. Box 4 is social security tax withheld. Box 5 is Medicare wages and tips. Box 6 is Medicare tax withheld. The instructions explain that social security wages can differ from box 1 because the two lines follow different inclusion rules, and they explain that social security wages are reported only up to the wage base the Social Security Administration publishes for the year. This page does not restate that wage base. Read it on the SSA or IRS page cited in the instructions for the year printed on the form.

Medicare wages in box 5 are not capped the same way. The instructions say Medicare wages and tips are reported even when they exceed the social security wage base, and they describe the additional Medicare tax withholding that can appear in box 6 when wages pass the threshold in the instructions. Again, the threshold lives in the instructions for the year, not on this page. If box 3 and box 5 differ, that difference is expected in the situations the instructions describe. It is not, on its own, evidence of an error.

Box 7 is social security tips. Box 8 is allocated tips. Allocated tips are a special figure for certain large food and beverage establishments. The instructions define when an employer must allocate tips and they warn that allocated tips are not included in boxes 1, 3, 5, or 7. A reader who has never worked in that setting will usually see box 8 blank. A blank box 8 is ordinary for most jobs.

Benefits, codes, and checkboxes

Box 10 is dependent care benefits. It reports the total dependent care benefits paid or incurred by the employer, including amounts paid through a cafeteria plan. The instructions describe how that total can interact with the credit and exclusion rules on the individual return. This page names the box. It does not apply the credit.

Box 11 is nonqualified plans. It is used for distributions and deferrals under nonqualified deferred compensation plans and for certain nongovernmental section 457 plans, in the way the instructions spell out. The box is easy to misread because the same line can carry a deferral in one year and a distribution in another. The instructions give the sign and the timing. Follow those, not a summary.

Box 12 is a set of lettered codes. Each code is a separate item: elective deferrals, Roth contributions, adoption benefits, uncollected social security tax on tips, and many others. The instructions contain the code list. A code without the list is just a letter. When more than four items apply, employers use more than one Form W-2, and the instructions say how box 12 continues onto the extra form. Do not add the codes together unless the instructions for those particular codes say they are the same kind of amount.

Box 13 has three checkboxes: statutory employee, retirement plan, and third-party sick pay. A mark in a checkbox is a classification, not a dollar amount. Statutory employee is a defined category in the instructions. Retirement plan means the employee was an active participant in certain plans, which can matter for an individual retirement arrangement deduction described elsewhere in IRS publications. Third-party sick pay means sick pay was paid by a third party. The checkbox does not state the amount of sick pay. Amounts, if any, are in the numbered boxes the instructions identify.

Box 14 is labeled Other. Employers may use it for items such as union dues, health insurance premiums, or nontaxable income, and the instructions say the employer should label whatever it puts there. An unlabeled figure in box 14 is a question for the employer, not a figure this page will interpret.

State and local boxes

Boxes 15 through 20 repeat a shorter wage story for state and local tax. Box 15 names the state and the employer's state identification number. Box 16 is state wages. Box 17 is state income tax withheld. Boxes 18, 19, and 20 are local wages, local income tax, and the name of the locality. Two states can appear when the employee worked in more than one state. The form provides two rows for that reason. State wages need not equal box 1. State rules differ, and the instructions say the state amount follows the state's own definition. The state revenue department, not this page, publishes that definition.

How to use this page

Read the box label, then read the matching paragraph in the IRS instructions for the year on the form. If the employer and the instructions disagree about a box, the correction path in the instructions is a Form W-2c from the employer. Keep the employee's copy with the rest of the year's wage records. This description is general information, not tax, legal or financial advice. Talk to a qualified tax professional about your situation.

Corrections, deadlines, and the transmittal

The instructions also cover the transmittal, Form W-3, which the employer sends with Copy A. An employee does not file Form W-3. It is useful to know it exists so that a conversation with payroll uses the same names. The instructions give the due date for furnishing copies to employees and the due date for filing Copy A. Those dates are printed in the instructions for the year. They can move when a date falls on a weekend or holiday, which the instructions explain. This page does not reprint the calendar.

If an employee does not receive a form, the instructions describe the steps the IRS lists, including contacting the employer and, later, the IRS phone line named in the form instructions. A substitute statement is a different procedure, also described there. None of those steps is a reason to invent the missing boxes. Wait for the statement or follow the IRS contact path the instructions name.

Electronic delivery is allowed only when the instructions' consent rules are met. An email attachment is not automatically a proper copy. The consent has to meet the requirements the instructions list. A person who prefers paper can withhold consent. That choice is described by the IRS, not by this site.

Written with the IRS general instructions as the source. This content is general information, not tax, legal or financial advice. Talk to a qualified tax professional about your situation.