No Tax on Overtime HelpThe whole check was the rumor.

How the lump gets built.

Time and a half is the regular rate plus half of that rate. When a stub prints one overtime figure, it has added those parts together. The deduction, when it applies, wants the half, not the sum. Dividing a combined time-and-a-half figure by three is one way the notice recovers the half. It is an example, not a promise that your stub was built that cleanly.

Double time is a different build. A premium shown apart from the regular rate can be divided by two in the notice's example. A figure that already combines the double-time pay can be divided by four. Using the time-and-a-half recipe on a double-time stub produces a number the form will not recognize as yours.

Anything above the premium section 7 requires is left out even after the division. A contract that pays more than time and a half does not donate the extra to the deduction. The extra can still be real pay. It is just not this line.

Why the rumor travels.

The headline was larger than the line. People who work the extra hours heard that overtime would not be taxed, and they heard it as the check. Owners heard it as a question they would have to answer on Friday. Both heard a true statute and a false size.

The correction is not a speech about the headline. It is the two lines on one week, then the cap, then the wage form you actually received. If 2025 did not isolate the half, the notice still gives a way to read the lump. Later years may print a cleaner form. We do not pretend 2025 already did.

Social Security and Medicare never left the conversation. A worker who plans as if the premium vanished from the paycheck will be short on Friday and confused in April. The return is where the half can matter. The paycheck is where the wages still are.

Describe the lump on the stub