But dig deeper into the international ratings, and you quickly discover international audiences have some pretty random tastes in television. In France, for example, ABCâs short-lived 2014 crime drama Forever (the one about an immortal coroner) currently stands as the most-watched American TV show of the year. And in Romania, Lifetimeâs now-dead Drop Dead Diva is a top-ten hit.
For 2014, the employee's share of the Social Security portion of the FICA tax is 6.2% of gross compensation up to a limit of $117,000 of gross compensation (resulting in a maximum Social Security tax of $7,254).
The largest of these social insurance taxes are the two federal payroll taxes, which show up as FICA and MEDFICA on your pay stub. The first is a 12.4 percent tax to fund Social Security, and the second is a 2.9 percent tax to fund Medicare, for a combined rate of 15.3 percent. Half of payroll taxes (7.65 percent) are remitted directly by employers, while the other half (7.65 percent) are taken out of workersâ paychecks.