Did you know your employer also pays tax on your salary? It costs the employer $35 to pay you $1,154. In other words, every time you spend $10 of your hard-earned money, $2.28 goes to the government.

So, with you and the employer both paying tax, what used to be a 19.8% tax rate now rises to 22.2%, meaning your real tax rate is actually 2.4% higher than what it seemed at first.