Health and Safety Engineers, Except Mining Safety Engineers and Inspectors in Virginia
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$77,369
after federal, FICA and Virginia tax
Tax takes
$27,551
26.3% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$76,794
Virginia costs more than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in 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
$104,920
Kept after tax
$77,369
Worth in national money
$76,794
State rank
26
of 45 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Virginia sits in the middle of the pack for this job. The median is $104,920, ranking 26 of 45 states with figures. Close enough to the national middle that where you live matters more than the headline suggests.
- Locally, this pays well. Among 489 occupations Virginia reports, this job comes in at 65 — comfortably in the upper quarter.
- Cost of living is unremarkable here. From $104,920, tax leaves $77,369, and adjusting for local prices barely moves it — about $76,794 in comparable terms. Averages run higher here, $110,730, since top earners drag the number up.
- Virginia occupies the middle band for health and safety engineers, except mining safety engineers and inspectors: a median of $104,920, ranking 26 of 45. Where nominal pay is close to the national figure, the tax and price adjustments below carry proportionally more weight in determining the real outcome.
- Health and safety engineers, except mining safety engineers and inspectors ranks 65 of 489 occupations by median in Virginia, in the top quartile. Within-state position is largely independent of national position, so this holds regardless of how the state compares to others for the same work.
- Because Virginia sits close to the national price level, the real-terms figure for health and safety engineers, except mining safety engineers and inspectors — median $104,920 — tracks the post-tax figure closely: $77,369 retained, $76,794 adjusted. ⚠️ Neither is a wage; the second describes what the first buys. Mean pay of $110,730 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Health and Safety Engineers, Except Mining Safety Engineers and Inspectors
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $63,760 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $104,920 |
| Top tenth earn over | $162,630 |
| This salary | $104,920 |
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 Virginia | $77,369 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $82,641 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$8,250 |
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 | $97,426 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$11,396 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 101 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Treat $104,920 as a midpoint for Virginia, not a promise. The tenth percentile is $63,760 and the ninetieth is $162,630 — a wide band, and where you land in it depends on far more than the state.
- That $77,369 take-home in Virginia comes from $104,920. 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 65 of 489.
- Two cautions on $76,794, the adjusted value of that $104,920 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of 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 65 of 489 locally.
- The Virginia median of $104,920 describes the midpoint of a distribution spanning $63,760 to $162,630. 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 $77,369, from $104,920, assumes a single Virginia 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 65 of 489 locally, and the state ranks 26 of 45 for it.
- This $76,794 adjusted figure, worked from $104,920, 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 65 of 489 in the state. The occupation ranks 65 of 489 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 $110,730 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?
The label is broader than the work. From $63,760 at the bottom tenth to $162,630 at the top, the same title covers roles that share little beyond a name.
Does a bigger number here mean I am better off?
The number and the value are different things. Virginia costs more than the national average, so this take-home stretches like $76,794 rather than its face figure.
Where does the difference between the wage and my paycheck go?
Four deductions, stacked. The federal layer and the two payroll taxes apply wherever you work; Virginia then takes its own share, leaving $77,369.
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 45 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 Virginia is $110,730. 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 ($63,760) and the ninetieth ($162,630) 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?
Virginia's regional price parity sits above the national average, so nominal wages overstate purchasing power. Deflating take-home by the state price level gives $76,794 in national-average terms. ⚠️ RPPs are an all-items index; housing parities vary far more widely than the headline figure.
What accounts for the gap between gross wage and take-home here?
Take-home of $77,369 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and 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 45 of the fifty-one jurisdictions. Suppression reflects sample size and confidentiality rules, and cannot be read as an absence of employment.