Editors in Alaska
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$53,307
after federal, FICA and Alaska tax
Tax takes
$10,323
16.2% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$52,408
Alaska costs more than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Alaska — roughly, since only five points along the band are published.
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
$63,630
Kept after tax
$53,307
Worth in national money
$52,408
State rank
25
of 50 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Middling, nationally. Alaska pays editors around $63,630 at the midpoint, 25 of 50 states. The interesting numbers on this page are the two below it.
- Against other work in Alaska, this sits in the middle: 230 of 430 occupations with published pay. Solidly ordinary for the state, which is not the same as ordinary nationally.
- Cost of living is unremarkable here. From $63,630, tax leaves $53,307, and adjusting for local prices barely moves it — about $52,408 in comparable terms. Averages run higher here, $73,930, since top earners drag the number up.
- For editors the Alaska median is $63,630, ranking 25 of 50 states reporting. Mid-band nominal positions are the ones most frequently reordered by the adjustments, because no large wage premium exists to absorb a state's tax or price level.
- Editors ranks 230 of 430 occupations in Alaska by median pay, in the middle bands. Within-state and national positions are separate measurements and a job commonly sits in different quartiles on each.
- Because Alaska sits close to the national price level, the real-terms figure for editors — median $63,630 — tracks the post-tax figure closely: $53,307 retained, $52,408 adjusted. ⚠️ Neither is a wage; the second describes what the first buys. Mean pay of $73,930 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Editors
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $43,030 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $63,630 |
| Top tenth earn over | $106,250 |
| This salary | $63,630 |
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
| Take-home in Alaska | $53,307 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $53,307 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$2,448 |
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
| To match take-home only | $63,630 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$2,961 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 102 |
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 editors in Alaska earn under $63,630 and half over. The published range runs $43,030 at the tenth percentile to $106,250 at the ninetieth. Experience and employer move an individual a long way inside that.
- In Alaska the take-home figure of $53,307, from $63,630, assumes one filer, no dependants, and nothing paid into a pension before tax. Each of those lowers the bill, so treat it as the plain case. City and school-district income taxes are not included either, and in a few states those are real money. It ranks 230 of 430 occupations here.
- Two cautions on $52,408, the adjusted value of that $63,630 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Alaska. 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 230 of 430 locally.
- Figures are distribution medians for editors in Alaska, not entry or offer rates. The published band runs $43,030 to $106,250; 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.
- Take-home for Alaska is computed for a single filer taking the standard deduction with no dependants and no pre-tax contributions, giving $53,307 from $63,630. Each omitted item reduces taxable income, so the figure is a lower bound on retained pay for this household shape. Municipal and school-district income taxes are excluded, which understates the burden materially in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Maryland. The occupation ranks 230 of 430 locally.
- This $52,408 adjusted figure, worked from $63,630, 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 230 of 430 in the state. The occupation ranks 230 of 430 locally.
Questions people ask
Is this the average pay for the job?
Half earn more than this and half earn less. The average sits at $73,930 because a long tail of high pay lifts it, so the two answer different questions.
Why is the pay range for this job so wide?
Because one job title covers very different work. The bottom tenth here earn $43,030 and the top tenth $106,250 — experience, employer and specialism separate them, and a single figure hides all three.
Does a bigger number here mean I am better off?
Not on its own. Prices in Alaska run above the national level, so the same dollars buy less here. Adjusted for that, this pay is worth $52,408 — the wage did not change, only what it covers.
Is most of this wage taxed away?
No. $53,307 survives, because Alaska levies no wage income tax. The federal share does not change with the state you work in.
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 Alaska is $73,930. 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 ($43,030) and the ninetieth ($106,250) 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.
How does the state price level affect real compensation?
Alaska's regional price parity sits above the national average, so nominal wages overstate purchasing power. Deflating take-home by the state price level gives $52,408 in national-average terms. ⚠️ RPPs are an all-items index; housing parities vary far more widely than the headline figure.
Why is the take-home ratio comparatively high in this state?
Alaska levies no personal income tax on wages, so take-home of $53,307 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.
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.