Guide
Quebec is a different calculation, not a variation
Updated
The riskiest thing a Canadian payroll tool can do is apply a national model to a Quebec employee and adjust one number. Quebec is different programmes, not a different rate.
Talk to a specialist One salary in, and you have the employer's CPP, CPP2 and EI for 2026, with every rate traceable to CRA.
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How this calculator works
- 2026 rates, employment outside Quebec. Quebec employment is a different calculation. It uses the Quebec Pension Plan rather than CPP, adds the Quebec Parental Insurance Plan, and carries a reduced EI rate (1.30% for employees in 2026, against 1.63% elsewhere). This tool does not model QPP or QPIP and should not be used for a Quebec employee (CRA).
- CPP: the 2026 maximum annual pensionable earnings are $74,600, the basic exemption is $3,500, and maximum contributory earnings are $71,100. The employee and employer contribution rate is 5.95% each, giving a maximum annual employee and employer contribution of $4,230.45 (CRA).
- CPP2: the 2026 additional maximum annual pensionable earnings are $85,000, the employee and employer rate is 4%, and the maximum annual employee and employer contribution is $416. CPP2 applies to earnings above the annual maximum pensionable earnings (CRA).
- EI: the 2026 maximum annual insurable earnings are $68,900 and the employee rate is 1.63%, giving a maximum annual employee premium of $1,123.07. CRA states that "the employer's premium will be 1.4 times this amount", giving a maximum annual employer premium of $1,572.30 (CRA).
- The employer EI figure is computed from the employee premium, not from insurable earnings, because that is how CRA defines it: 1.4 times the employee's premium, after rounding. Computing it as 1.4 times the rate applied to earnings gives a figure that differs by cents from the published maximum.
- Every published maximum reproduces exactly from these inputs, which checks that the tool and the source agree. ($74,600 minus $3,500) x 5.95% = $4,230.45. ($85,000 minus $74,600) x 4% = $416. $68,900 x 1.63% = $1,123.07, and x 1.4 = $1,572.30.
- The rates and ceilings are statutory in structure and announced annually in amount. Schedule 1 of the Canada Pension Plan sets the base rate at 4.95% for employees and employers from 2003 onward. Schedule 2 sets the first additional rate at 1.0% each from 2024, making the 5.95% above, and the second additional rate at 4.0% each from 2024.
- Section 20(2) fixes the Year's Basic Exemption at $3,500 for each year after 1997. Section 18.1(1)(b) sets the additional maximum pensionable earnings at 1.14 times the maximum pensionable earnings for 2025 and later, rounded down to the next multiple of $100. That is how $74,600 produces $85,000 (Canada Pension Plan).
- Not included: vacation pay, statutory holiday pay, benefits, pension contributions, workers compensation premiums, provincial health or payroll levies such as the Employer Health Tax, and any territorial payroll tax. Those vary by province and by employer and are not modelled here, so the figure is the federal statutory floor rather than the full cost of employment.
- The CPP exemption setting covers employees under 18, employees over 70, and employees for whom an election not to contribute is in force. An employer contributes only where the employee does. EI is unaffected by that setting and continues.
- These figures change every January. The date at the top of this page is when the rates were read from CRA, and it is the date they belong to.
The Quebec Pension Plan, not CPP
An employee working in Quebec contributes to the Quebec Pension Plan rather than to the Canada Pension Plan, and the employer contributes to QPP alongside them. It is administered separately.
So the CPP figures on this page do not apply, and this tool does not model QPP. Substituting a rate would produce a number that looks right and is not.
QPIP, which has no equivalent elsewhere
Quebec operates the Quebec Parental Insurance Plan, with its own employee and employer premiums, and there is no corresponding line in the rest of the country.
An employer budgeting for a Quebec hire from a national model will be short by the whole of it.
EI is reduced, and it is the one figure that carries across
Because QPIP covers the parental benefits that EI provides elsewhere, the EI rate in Quebec is lower. CRA publishes a 2026 employee rate of 1.30% for Quebec against 1.63% elsewhere, on the same maximum insurable earnings of $68,900.
That gives a maximum employee premium of $895.70 and, at the same 1.4 multiplier, a maximum employer premium of $1,253.98. Those two figures are the only part of a Quebec calculation this page can give you.
What to do instead
Use a Quebec calculation for Quebec employment. The programmes are administered by different bodies with their own published rates, and the correct figures come from them rather than from an adjustment to a national tool.
Where a business employs on both sides of the border, treat them as two payroll calculations rather than one with a province field, because that is what they are.