Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operators, Surface Mining in Texas
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$41,552
after federal, FICA and Texas tax
Tax takes
$7,449
15.2% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$42,759
Texas costs less than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Texas — 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
$49,000
Kept after tax
$41,552
Worth in national money
$42,759
State rank
41
of 49 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Texas is among the lower-paying states for this job. The middle earner takes $49,000, ranking 41 of 49 states — about 14.68% below the national middle. Costs here are often lower too, which the figures further down account for.
- Ordinary, locally speaking. This job ranks 281 among 493 occupations Texas publishes pay for.
- Cost of living is unremarkable here. From $49,000, tax leaves $41,552, and adjusting for local prices barely moves it — about $42,759 in comparable terms. Averages run higher here, $51,770, since top earners drag the number up.
- Texas ranks 41 of 49 for excavating and loading machine and dragline operators, surface mining, with a median of $49,000 — about 14.68% below the national figure. A nominal shortfall is not by itself a real one: lower-paying states frequently carry lower tax and lower price levels, and the adjusted figures below are where that is settled rather than assumed.
- Position 281 of 493 in Texas places excavating and loading machine and dragline operators, surface mining 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 Texas sits close to the national price level, the real-terms figure for excavating and loading machine and dragline operators, surface mining — median $49,000 — tracks the post-tax figure closely: $41,552 retained, $42,759 adjusted. ⚠️ Neither is a wage; the second describes what the first buys. Mean pay of $51,770 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operators, Surface Mining
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $38,760 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $49,000 |
| Top tenth earn over | $67,560 |
| This salary | $49,000 |
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 Texas | $41,552 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Florida | $41,552 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | −$2,594 |
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 | $49,000 |
|---|---|
| Raise you would need | +$3,340 |
| Prices in Florida | 103 vs 97 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Half the people doing this work in Texas earn less than $49,000. The published range is $38,760 up to $67,560, so an individual figure can sit a long way from the middle in either direction.
- That $41,552 take-home in Texas comes from $49,000. 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 281 of 493.
- One number stands for prices across all of Texas, which is a simplification — big cities cost far more than small towns. Read $42,759, the adjusted value of that $49,000 median, as a way to compare states fairly, not as a quote for any particular place. The two datasets are also from different years. This job sits at 281 of 493 in the state.
- Reported values are medians; for excavating and loading machine and dragline operators, surface mining in Texas the tenth-to-ninetieth percentile band is $38,760 to $67,560. Neither the median nor the band is an offer rate, and neither accounts for hours, shift differentials or overtime.
- Retained pay of $41,552, from $49,000, assumes a single Texas 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 281 of 493 locally, and the state ranks 41 of 49 for it.
- Price deflation uses one statewide parity for Texas, so $42,759 — the adjusted value of that $49,000 median — establishes comparability between states rather than accuracy within one. The wage and parity series are dated independently, each following its own publication cycle, and neither is projected forward. This occupation sits at 281 of 493 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 $51,770 because a long tail of high pay lifts it, so the two answer different questions.
How much does pay for this job actually vary?
Less than you might expect. The bottom tenth earn $38,760 and the top tenth $67,560, so most people doing this work in Texas sit within a fairly tight band.
What does this pay actually buy where I live?
More than the figure suggests. Prices in Texas sit below the national level, so take-home here stretches like $42,759 would elsewhere. The wage is the same; the ground it covers is larger.
Is most of this wage taxed away?
Less than people assume. $41,552 of this wage reaches your account, because Texas takes no income tax from wages — but federal tax, Social Security and Medicare still apply exactly as they do everywhere else.
Why is this job missing from some states?
The survey withholds small samples rather than publish an unreliable number. Pay appears for 49 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 Texas is $51,770. 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 ($38,760 to $67,560) sits at or below the family's median dispersion, indicating relatively standardized compensation. Percentiles are published per state, so this dispersion is specific to Texas rather than a national figure.
What is this occupation's price-adjusted compensation in this state?
Texas'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 $42,759 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?
Texas levies no personal income tax on wages, so take-home of $41,552 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 49 of the fifty-one jurisdictions. Suppression reflects sample size and confidentiality rules, and cannot be read as an absence of employment.