There are no wage tax privileges for working students. On the contrary: working students and short-term employees often pay slightly higher taxes compared to employees subject to full social security. This is because employees subject to social security can reduce their tax burden through their social security contributions. This tax relief does not apply to working students, as they are exempt from health, long-term care, and unemployment insurance, and therefore lack the corresponding deductions to reduce their taxable income.
Primary Employment (Hauptbeschäftigung) If your employment at jobvalley is registered as your primary job, different tax brackets apply based on your personal status:
Single and Childless (Tax Bracket I): If jobvalley is the primary employer and the employee is neither married nor has children.
Single Parents and Widowed (Tax Bracket II): The employee must inform the employer of this status.
Married or in a Civil Partnership (Brackets III, IV, or V): The choice depends on the distribution of earnings between the partners.
Secondary Employment (Nebenbeschäftigung) If the work at jobvalley is registered as a secondary job (because another job already exists as primary employment), Tax Bracket VI applies. Many students mistakenly choose this because they think their studies are their primary "activity." However, in tax law, studying does not count as employment. Tax Bracket VI only applies if you are already being taxed in brackets I-V by another employer.
Tax Bracket Inquiry in the jobvalley App You provide your tax information directly in the jobvalley app. There, you will be asked whether the position is a primary or secondary employment relationship.
Important: You do not directly select a number (e.g., "1") in the app; instead, you provide your basic tax details.
Based on your information and your Tax ID, we retrieve the tax bracket currently registered for you from the tax office via the electronic ELStAM procedure. This ensures that payroll is always processed based on the official data reported to the tax authorities.