Bartenders in Nevada

Fresh vegetables and a plated meal at a professional kitchen prep station.

May 2025 wages · tax year 2026

You keep

$24,223

after federal, FICA and Nevada tax

Tax takes

$3,237

11.8% of the whole

Worth, in national money

$24,978

Nevada costs less than average

One filer, standard deduction, no dependants and nothing paid in before tax — the same household the rest of this page uses, so the comparison holds. City and school-district income taxes are not included.

Median here

$27,460

Kept after tax

$24,223

Worth in national money

$24,978

State rank

38

of 51 states

What this pays, and what it is worth

  • The nominal figure here is modest. Nevada pays bartenders a middle wage of $27,460, 38 of 51 states and about 20.03% below the national middle. Hold that thought until the adjusted numbers.
  • Within Nevada this is lower-paid work. Of 485 occupations the state publishes figures for, bartenders ranks 479. That is the bottom quarter locally, whatever the national comparison says.
  • Cheaper living works in this state's favor. From $27,460 you keep $24,223 after tax, and local prices stretch that to the equivalent of $24,978 at national prices. Averages run higher here, $36,210, since top earners drag the number up.
  • Nevada's $27,460 median for bartenders places it 38 of 51 states, about 20.03% below national. Because both the tax and price adjustments tend to favor lower-nominal states, this ranking is the least stable of the three reported here.
  • Against every occupation Nevada reports, bartenders ranks 479 of 485, in the lowest quartile of the state's distribution. That position is set by the local labor market and is independent of how the state compares nationally for this work.
  • Retained pay in Nevada is $24,223 after the full tax stack, from $27,460. Because the state's price level runs below the national average, the price-adjusted equivalent is $24,978 — a real-terms figure describing purchasing power rather than compensation, and not a number that appears on any pay stub. Mean pay of $36,210 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.

Compare this career across states

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Pay band: Bartenders

The state median for this job

50thpercentile, roughly
Lowest tenth earn under$24,960
Half earn under$27,460
Top tenth earn over$47,250
This salary$27,460

Positions between the published tenth, quarter, half, three-quarter and ninetieth points are estimated by straight line.

The same pay, somewhere else

The state median for this job

Compare with
$0take-home per year in Texas
Take-home in Nevada$24,223
Take-home in Texas$24,223
Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity−$50

The raise and the real gain point in opposite directions here.

State income tax and state price levels only. No city income tax, and no housing market.

What you would need there

The state median for this job

Moving to
$0$27,519
$27,519in Texas, for the same life
To match take-home only$27,460
Raise you would need+$59
Prices in Texas97 vs 97

State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.

Sources and assumptions
  • A median is the middle, not an offer. Half of bartenders in Nevada earn under $27,460 and half over. The published range runs $24,960 at the tenth percentile to $47,250 at the ninetieth. Experience and employer move an individual a long way inside that.
  • One filer, no dependants, no pension contributions — that is the household behind Nevada's $24,223, worked from $27,460. That is on purpose. It lets states be compared with each other, not with each other's family circumstances. Local city taxes are left out. Locally this work ranks 479 of 485.
  • Two cautions on $24,978, the adjusted value of that $27,460 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Nevada. No actual address matches that. The wage figures and price figures are also from different years. Each is published on its own timetable. This work sits at 479 of 485 locally.
  • Figures are distribution medians for bartenders in Nevada, not entry or offer rates. The published band runs $24,960 to $47,250; within-state dispersion of that width routinely exceeds the dispersion between states, so tenure, employer and metropolitan area predict an individual's pay better than geography does.
  • The Nevada take-home of $24,223, on $27,460 for work ranking 479 of 485 locally, models the simplest household deliberately: holding it constant is what makes the interstate comparison meaningful. It also means the absolute figure overstates liability for most real filers, and municipal income taxes are outside the model entirely. The occupation ranks 479 of 485 in the state.
  • This $24,978 adjusted figure, worked from $27,460, rests on a state-level price parity averaging over within-state dispersion larger than much of the between-state dispersion. Wage and price vintages differ by publication schedule. The result is directionally sound and not address-specific, for work at 479 of 485 in the state. The occupation ranks 479 of 485 locally.

Questions people ask

Is this the average pay for the job?

No — it is the middle. Half of these workers earn more and half earn less. The average is $36,210, pulled upward by the top of the range, which is why the middle is the fairer number to plan against.

Why is the pay range for this job so wide?

One title, many jobs. The lowest tenth take $24,960, the highest tenth $47,250, and what separates them is experience, employer and what exactly the role does.

What does this pay actually buy where I live?

Further than the number implies. Nevada is cheaper than the national average, so this take-home behaves like $24,978 in national terms.

Is most of this wage taxed away?

No. $24,223 survives, because Nevada levies no wage income tax. The federal share does not change with the state you work in.

Can I compare this job across every state?

Yes for this one. Pay is published in all 51 jurisdictions, so a state-to-state comparison here rests on the same survey everywhere rather than on a patchwork.

How does the published median differ from the mean for this occupation?

The median is the midpoint of the distribution; the mean for this occupation in Nevada is $36,210. Wage distributions are right-skewed, so the mean exceeds the median wherever a minority earn substantially more. BLS publishes both because substituting one for the other misstates a typical worker's pay.

What drives the percentile dispersion in this occupation?

Dispersion between the tenth percentile ($24,960) and the ninetieth ($47,250) exceeds the family median dispersion. SOC codes aggregate roles differing in seniority, industry and specialisation, and BLS does not disaggregate below the detailed occupation level, so within-title variance is not separable from the published series.

What is this occupation's price-adjusted compensation in this state?

Nevada's regional price parity is at or below the national average, so nominal wages understate purchasing power. Take-home deflated by the state price level is $24,978 in national-average terms. The adjustment uses an all-items index and does not isolate housing.

Why is the take-home ratio comparatively high in this state?

Nevada levies no personal income tax on wages, so take-home of $24,223 reflects the federal layer and FICA alone. Federal income tax and FICA are unchanged; states without a wage income tax generally recover revenue through consumption and property bases instead.

Is this occupation's state coverage complete?

State-level estimates are published for all 51 jurisdictions for this occupation, so cross-state comparison is not confounded by suppression. ⚠️ Estimates remain survey-based and carry sampling error; small differences between adjacent states should not be over-read.