Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open.

Should I negotiate a lower salary to be placed in a lower tax bracket?
No, absolutely not.  Income tax rates are marginal.  The tax bracket's higher tax rate only applies to extra dollars over the threshold, not to dollars below it.  The normal income tax does not have any cliffs where one extra dollar of income will cost more than one dollar in extra taxes. Moreover, you are ignoring the personal exemption and standard deduction.  A gross salary of $72,000 is not the same as taxable income of $72,000.  The deduction will generally be $12,200 and the exemptions will be $3,900 for you, your spouse, and any kids.  So married-filing-jointly with the standard deduction will get an automatic $20,000 off of adjusted gross income when counting taxable income.  So the appropriate taxable income is actually going to be more like $52,000. Note that getting your compensation package reshuffled may result in different tax treatment.  But simply taking a smaller salary (rather than taking some compensation as stock options, health insurance, or fringe benefits), is not a money-saving move.  Never do it.