Clergy in Delaware

Two armchairs facing each other in a welcoming counseling room.

May 2025 wages · tax year 2026

You keep

$50,065

after federal, FICA and Delaware tax

Tax takes

$13,195

20.9% of the whole

Worth, in national money

$50,442

Delaware 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

$63,260

Kept after tax

$50,065

Worth in national money

$50,442

State rank

13

of 50 states

What this pays, and what it is worth

  • This is a good state for the work. Delaware pays clergy a middle wage of $63,260, ranking 13 of 50 states and sitting about 4.03% above the national middle.
  • Ordinary, locally speaking. Clergy ranks 197 among 445 occupations Delaware publishes pay for.
  • Cost of living is unremarkable here. From $63,260, tax leaves $50,065, and adjusting for local prices barely moves it — about $50,442 in comparable terms. Averages run higher here, $65,850, since top earners drag the number up.
  • Delaware's median for clergy is $63,260, about 4.03% above the national figure and 13 of 50 states reporting. Whether that premium reaches the worker depends on the two adjustments below, which is the part a wage table cannot tell you.
  • Position 197 of 445 in Delaware places clergy in the middle of the state's wage distribution. Because within-state and cross-state rankings measure different things, this figure and the national one above should be read together rather than as a single verdict.
  • Because Delaware sits close to the national price level, the real-terms figure for clergy — median $63,260 — tracks the post-tax figure closely: $50,065 retained, $50,442 adjusted. ⚠️ Neither is a wage; the second describes what the first buys. Mean pay of $65,850 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.

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Pay band: Clergy

The state median for this job

50thpercentile, roughly
Lowest tenth earn under$51,270
Half earn under$63,260
Top tenth earn over$78,150
This salary$63,260

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
+$2,944take-home per year in Texas
Take-home in Delaware$50,065
Take-home in Texas$53,009
Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity+$4,108

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
$0now · $63,260$58,291
$58,291in Texas, for the same life
To match take-home only$59,596
You could take a cut of−$4,969
Prices in Texas97 vs 99

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

Sources and assumptions
  • Treat $63,260 as a midpoint for Delaware, not a promise. The tenth percentile is $51,270 and the ninetieth is $78,150 — a wide band, and where you land in it depends on far more than the state.
  • That $50,065 take-home in Delaware comes from $63,260. It is the no-frills case: single filer, standard deduction, nothing set aside before tax. Real circumstances almost always reduce the tax. City and school-district taxes are not counted at all. Locally the work ranks 197 of 445.
  • Two cautions on $50,442, the adjusted value of that $63,260 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Delaware. 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 197 of 445 locally.
  • The Delaware median of $63,260 describes the midpoint of a distribution spanning $51,270 to $78,150. Because that spread is typically larger than the interstate spread, a state median is a weak predictor for any individual worker in this occupation.
  • Retained pay of $50,065, from $63,260, assumes a single Delaware filer with the standard deduction and no elective deferrals. Pre-tax retirement or HSA contributions, dependants and itemized deductions all reduce it further; local income taxes, excluded here, would increase it in the states that levy them. This occupation ranks 197 of 445 locally, and the state ranks 13 of 50 for it.
  • This $50,442 adjusted figure, worked from $63,260, 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 197 of 445 in the state. The occupation ranks 197 of 445 locally.

Questions people ask

Is this the average pay for the job?

It is the midpoint, not the average. The average here is $65,850, dragged up by high earners; the middle figure describes a typical worker better.

How much does pay for this job actually vary?

Most of these jobs pay within a close range — $51,270 at the tenth percentile, $78,150 at the ninetieth.

What does this pay actually buy where I live?

Further than the number implies. Delaware is cheaper than the national average, so this take-home behaves like $50,442 in national terms.

Where does the difference between the wage and my paycheck go?

Into four separate taxes, not one. Federal income tax, Social Security and Medicare apply everywhere, and Delaware adds its own income tax on top — which is why $50,065 of this wage survives to your account.

Why is this job missing from some states?

The survey withholds small samples rather than publish an unreliable number. Pay appears for 50 states here, and a missing state means too few reports, not no jobs.

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 Delaware is $65,850. 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 is the dispersion of this occupation's wage distribution?

The tenth-to-ninetieth percentile span ($51,270 to $78,150) sits at or below the family's median dispersion, indicating relatively standardized compensation. Percentiles are published per state, so this dispersion is specific to Delaware rather than a national figure.

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

Delaware'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 $50,442 in national-average terms. The adjustment uses an all-items index and does not isolate housing.

What accounts for the gap between gross wage and take-home here?

Take-home of $50,065 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and Delaware income tax for a single filer with no adjustments. The state layer is levied in addition to the federal one; only its rate and base differ between states.

Why does this occupation lack published estimates in every state?

BLS suppresses estimates failing disclosure or reliability criteria. This occupation has published state-level estimates in 50 of the fifty-one jurisdictions. Suppression reflects sample size and confidentiality rules, and cannot be read as an absence of employment.