About 1099 Math
A small, independent site building calculators for the money decisions self-employed people actually face.
Last updated
Why this exists
Search engines answer simple tax questions well. Ask what the self-employment tax rate is and you get 15.3% without clicking anything. What they cannot do is run your numbers: whether electing S-Corp is worth it at your income in your state, what salary matches your contract rate once you price in the employer half of FICA and the health insurance you now buy yourself, or what you actually owe on the next quarterly due date.
Those are decisions, not lookups. They need a calculator, and they need one that shows its work instead of producing a number you have to take on faith.
Who builds it
1099 Math is built and maintained by one developer. There is no newsroom and no team page, because there is no team.
This site is not run by accountants, and nobody here is a CPA, an enrolled agent or a tax attorney. Claiming otherwise would be easy and dishonest. What the site offers instead is verifiable work: every rate and threshold traces to the IRS publication or state schedule it came from, the date it was checked is shown on the page, and the arithmetic behind each result is published on the methodology page so you can check it yourself.
If you find a number that is wrong, that is the most valuable thing you can send us. See contact.
How it is paid for
The calculators are free and there is nothing to sign up for. The site is intended to earn money in two ways, neither of which is running yet:
- Affiliate links. Where a result points to a product that solves the problem — payroll software after an S-Corp election, for example — the site may link to it and receive a commission if you sign up. Any such link will be labelled where it appears.
- Advertising. The site may display ads from third-party ad networks.
Two rules govern that. A commission never changes what a calculator outputs: the arithmetic does not know and does not care whether a link is paid. And the site will not recommend something it would not recommend unpaid. If those ever conflict, the calculator wins.
What this site does not do
- It does not file anything, or connect to the IRS, or to your bank.
- It does not give tax advice. See the disclaimer.
- It has no accounts, and currently collects nothing about you. See privacy.