Box 18 (W-2) may often differ from Box 1 and Box 16. The fact that it is less for you would mean your local taxes could be less than if they were the same.
Box 16: State wages.
Box 16 reports the total amount
of taxable wages earned in that state. If you worked for the same
employer in multiple state, there may be multiple lines of information.
Box 17: State income tax withheld. Box 17 reports the total amount of state income taxes withheld from your paychecks for the wages reported in Box 16. This amount may be deductible as part of the deduction for state and local income taxes on Schedule A.
Box 18: Local wages.
Box 18 reports the total amount of wages subject to local, city, or other state income taxes. Often different than Box 16 and Box 1 (Federal Wages).
Most likely due to the treatment of certain employee benefits.
Box 18 (W-2) may often differ from Box 1 and Box 16. The fact that it is less for you would mean your local taxes could be less than if they were the same.
Box 16: State wages.
Box 16 reports the total amount
of taxable wages earned in that state. If you worked for the same
employer in multiple state, there may be multiple lines of information.
Box 17: State income tax withheld. Box 17 reports the total amount of state income taxes withheld from your paychecks for the wages reported in Box 16. This amount may be deductible as part of the deduction for state and local income taxes on Schedule A.
Box 18: Local wages.
Box 18 reports the total amount of wages subject to local, city, or other state income taxes. Often different than Box 16 and Box 1 (Federal Wages).
Can we please revisit this question in 2022. A little different though. On one of my W2s box 18 is the same as box 1,3,5,16. Why would that be? I tried to google the answer and cannot find an answer besides that box 1 and and 18 should be different. Box 18 being usually lower. I have 3 W2s this year, and going through last years W2s none of them have anything in box 18. I worked as nurse in an Adult day care( LLC).
Sometimes Box 1 is lower, but not always. Box 18 is for state and local taxes, not all W-2 will have these. If you are working in an area that has these taxes, it is common for the amount in Box 18 to match those other boxes you have mentioned. Those boxes represent your wage base for taxes. Box 1 is wages for federal taxes, Box 3 is wages for SS tax, Box 5 is wages for Medicare tax, Box 16 is wages for state income tax, and Box 18 is wage base for local taxes. You can verify with your employer what those local taxes are for, most likely it is a school district or some kind of municipality (town or city).
Just enter your W-2 exactly how you see it and TurboTax will take care of putting those amounts on the correct tax return. Your situation is a normal one. @Staticcreature
If any of the W-2s are W-2Cs (corrected copies of the same W-2), only enter those one time each.
I have the same question. Mine is significantly greater than Box 1 and 16, which makes no sense to me.