Sarah Patel, MST
Author Compensation & Classification MST SHRM-CP
About Sarah
Sarah Patel holds a Master of Science in Taxation (MST), a graduate-level degree focused exclusively on U.S. federal, state, and employment tax. She has 7 years of professional experience centered on compensation analysis, payroll classification, and the often-misunderstood line between W-2 employee status and 1099 contractor status.
Earlier in her career, Sarah managed corporate payroll operations inside a Fortune 500 employer, where she handled FLSA overtime classification across exempt and non-exempt populations, supplemental wage calculations for bonuses and commissions, and multistate withholding for a remote workforce. That hands-on payroll background is what informs her writing today: she has actually run the calculations she explains, across thousands of paychecks per cycle.
At CalcYet, Sarah authors content on FLSA overtime rules, salary-versus-hourly tradeoffs, bonus and supplemental-wage withholding, and the practical mechanics of evaluating job offers. She brings a compensation-analyst lens to the consumer-facing calculators, making sure realistic assumptions about hours per week, weeks per year, overtime multipliers, and supplemental withholding flow through every guide she publishes.
Areas of Expertise
- FLSA overtime rules (exempt vs non-exempt classification)
- Salary-to-hourly and hourly-to-salary conversions
- Bonus and supplemental wage withholding (aggregate vs flat 22% method)
- W-2 employee vs 1099 contractor classification
- Job-offer comparisons across pay structures and benefits
- Multistate payroll for remote-first employers
Education
- BA, Economics — University of Chicago
- MST, Master of Science in Taxation — DePaul University
Certifications and Professional Memberships
- SHRM-CP — Society for Human Resource Management, Certified Professional
- Member, Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM)
Articles by Sarah Patel, MST
- No, the Raise Won’t Push You Into a Worse Bracket. Here’s What Actually Happens in 2026.
- A $5,000 Deduction Saved a Client $600. A $5,000 Credit Would Have Saved Them $5,000.
- Salary vs Hourly: How to Compare Pay Structures Honestly
Connect
Contact and Corrections
To suggest a correction or ask Sarah a question about a specific article, please use the CalcYet contact form. Sarah personally reviews correction requests on compensation and classification content and updates relevant pages when FLSA guidance, supplemental-wage rates, or state-level overtime rules change.
Read more about CalcYet’s editorial standards and review process on the editorial team page.
Last updated: May 8, 2026