Education Teachers, Postsecondary in West Virginia
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$51,009
after federal, FICA and West Virginia tax
Tax takes
$12,261
19.4% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$56,820
West Virginia costs less than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in West Virginia — 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
$63,270
Kept after tax
$51,009
Worth in national money
$56,820
State rank
39
of 49 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Pay for this job is on the low side in West Virginia. The middle earner gets $63,270. That is 39 of 49 states, and about 16.03% under the national figure. Whether that matters depends on what things cost here.
- Against other work in West Virginia, this sits in the middle: 149 of 473 occupations with published pay. Solidly ordinary for the state, which is not the same as ordinary nationally.
- Cheaper living works in this state's favor. From $63,270 you keep $51,009 after tax, and local prices stretch that to the equivalent of $56,820 at national prices. Averages run higher here, $69,320, since top earners drag the number up.
- For education teachers, postsecondary, West Virginia sits in the lower band at $63,270, ranking 39 of 49 and trailing the national median by about 16.03%. Nominal rankings routinely invert once tax and regional price level are applied, so this position should not be read as the conclusion.
- Education teachers, postsecondary ranks 149 of 473 occupations in West Virginia 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.
- Retained pay in West Virginia is $51,009 after the full tax stack, from $63,270. Because the state's price level runs below the national average, the price-adjusted equivalent is $56,820 — a real-terms figure describing purchasing power rather than compensation, and not a number that appears on any pay stub. Mean pay of $69,320 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
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Pay band: Education Teachers, Postsecondary
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $45,310 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $63,270 |
| Top tenth earn over | $99,210 |
| This salary | $63,270 |
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 West Virginia | $51,009 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $53,017 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | −$2,262 |
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 | $60,770 |
|---|---|
| Raise you would need | +$2,735 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 90 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Treat $63,270 as a midpoint for West Virginia, not a promise. The tenth percentile is $45,310 and the ninetieth is $99,210 — a wide band, and where you land in it depends on far more than the state.
- One filer, no dependants, no pension contributions — that is the household behind West Virginia's $51,009, worked from $63,270. 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 149 of 473.
- Two cautions on $56,820, the adjusted value of that $63,270 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of West Virginia. 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 149 of 473 locally.
- The West Virginia median of $63,270 describes the midpoint of a distribution spanning $45,310 to $99,210. Because that spread is typically larger than the interstate spread, a state median is a weak predictor for any individual worker in this occupation.
- The West Virginia take-home of $51,009, on $63,270 for work ranking 149 of 473 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 149 of 473 in the state.
- This $56,820 adjusted figure, worked from $63,270, 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 149 of 473 in the state. The occupation ranks 149 of 473 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 $69,320, 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 $45,310, the highest tenth $99,210, and what separates them is experience, employer and what exactly the role does.
What does this pay actually buy where I live?
More than the figure suggests. Prices in West Virginia sit below the national level, so take-home here stretches like $56,820 would elsewhere. The wage is the same; the ground it covers is larger.
Where does the difference between the wage and my paycheck go?
Three of them are federal and one is not. After income tax, Social Security, Medicare and West Virginia's own levy, $51,009 remains.
Why is this job missing from some states?
Because the survey suppresses a figure when too few employers report it. This occupation has published pay in 49 states — the rest are withheld to protect confidentiality, which is not the same as nobody doing the work there.
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 West Virginia is $69,320. 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 ($45,310) and the ninetieth ($99,210) 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?
West Virginia'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 $56,820 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 $51,009 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and West Virginia 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 49 of the fifty-one jurisdictions. Suppression reflects sample size and confidentiality rules, and cannot be read as an absence of employment.