Extruding, Forming, Pressing, and Compacting Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders in Texas

Machined metal parts and a CNC machine in a clean manufacturing workshop.

May 2025 wages · tax year 2026

You keep

$32,480

after federal, FICA and Texas tax

Tax takes

$5,230

13.9% of the whole

Worth, in national money

$33,424

Texas 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

$37,710

Kept after tax

$32,480

Worth in national money

$33,424

State rank

43

of 45 states

What this pays, and what it is worth

  • Pay for this job is on the low side in Texas. The middle earner gets $37,710. That is 43 of 45 states, and about 17.59% under the national figure. Whether that matters depends on what things cost here.
  • Against 493 occupations Texas publishes, this job lands at 409. That is the lower quarter. That is the comparison people actually feel, more than any national table.
  • Cost of living is unremarkable here. From $37,710, tax leaves $32,480, and adjusting for local prices barely moves it — about $33,424 in comparable terms. Averages run higher here, $41,230, since top earners drag the number up.
  • For extruding, forming, pressing, and compacting machine setters, operators, and tenders, Texas sits in the lower band at $37,710, ranking 43 of 45 and trailing the national median by about 17.59%. Nominal rankings routinely invert once tax and regional price level are applied, so this position should not be read as the conclusion.
  • Within Texas, this work ranks 409 of 493 occupations by median pay, in the bottom quartile. The within-state position is the more salient one for anyone weighing this job against alternatives available to them locally.
  • Because Texas sits close to the national price level, the real-terms figure for extruding, forming, pressing, and compacting machine setters, operators, and tenders — median $37,710 — tracks the post-tax figure closely: $32,480 retained, $33,424 adjusted. ⚠️ Neither is a wage; the second describes what the first buys. Mean pay of $41,230 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.

Compare this career across states

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Pay band: Extruding, Forming, Pressing, and Compacting Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders

The state median for this job

50thpercentile, roughly
Lowest tenth earn under$32,860
Half earn under$37,710
Top tenth earn over$54,400
This salary$37,710

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 Florida
Take-home in Texas$32,480
Take-home in Florida$32,480
Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity−$2,028

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$40,321
$40,321in Florida, for the same life
To match take-home only$37,710
Raise you would need+$2,611
Prices in Florida103 vs 97

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

Sources and assumptions
  • Treat $37,710 as a midpoint for Texas, not a promise. The tenth percentile is $32,860 and the ninetieth is $54,400 — a wide band, and where you land in it depends on far more than the state.
  • In Texas the take-home figure of $32,480, from $37,710, 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 409 of 493 occupations here.
  • Two cautions on $33,424, the adjusted value of that $37,710 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Texas. 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 409 of 493 locally.
  • The Texas median of $37,710 describes the midpoint of a distribution spanning $32,860 to $54,400. Because that spread is typically larger than the interstate spread, a state median is a weak predictor for any individual worker in this occupation.
  • Take-home for Texas is computed for a single filer taking the standard deduction with no dependants and no pre-tax contributions, giving $32,480 from $37,710. 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 409 of 493 locally.
  • This $33,424 adjusted figure, worked from $37,710, 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 409 of 493 in the state. The occupation ranks 409 of 493 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 $41,230, pulled upward by the top of the range, which is why the middle is the fairer number to plan against.

How much does pay for this job actually vary?

The range here is narrow. From $32,860 at the bottom tenth to $54,400 at the top, pay for this work clusters rather than spreads.

What does this pay actually buy where I live?

Further than the number implies. Texas is cheaper than the national average, so this take-home behaves like $33,424 in national terms.

Is most of this wage taxed away?

Less than people assume. $32,480 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 45 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 $41,230. 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 ($32,860 to $54,400) 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 $33,424 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 $32,480 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 45 of the fifty-one jurisdictions. Suppression reflects sample size and confidentiality rules, and cannot be read as an absence of employment.