Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers in Missouri
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$44,384
after federal, FICA and Missouri tax
Tax takes
$10,166
18.6% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$48,369
Missouri costs less than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Missouri — 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
$54,550
Kept after tax
$44,384
Worth in national money
$48,369
State rank
41
of 51 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- The nominal figure here is modest. Missouri pays this job a middle wage of $54,550, 41 of 51 states and about 6.97% below the national middle. Hold that thought until the adjusted numbers.
- Ordinary, locally speaking. This job ranks 261 among 488 occupations Missouri publishes pay for.
- Here is where Missouri does better than its wage suggests. From a median of $54,550 you keep $44,384, and because things cost less here than the national average, that behaves like $48,369 would elsewhere. The average is higher, $56,830, because the best-paid pull it up.
- Missouri's $54,550 median for heavy and tractor-trailer truck drivers places it 41 of 51 states, about 6.97% below national. Because both the tax and price adjustments tend to favor lower-nominal states, this ranking is the least stable of the three reported here.
- Position 261 of 488 in Missouri places heavy and tractor-trailer truck drivers 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.
- After federal, FICA and Missouri income tax, retained pay for heavy and tractor-trailer truck drivers on $54,550 is $44,384. Deflating by the state's price level — below the national average — gives $48,369 in national-average terms. ⚠️ That figure is purchasing power, not a wage, and nobody is paid it; it is what the take-home buys. The mean of $56,830 sits above the median, the right skew typical of wage data.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $37,860 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $54,550 |
| Top tenth earn over | $77,510 |
| This salary | $54,550 |
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 Missouri | $44,384 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $46,011 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | −$1,021 |
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 | $52,526 |
|---|---|
| Raise you would need | +$1,234 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 92 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Treat $54,550 as a midpoint for Missouri, not a promise. The tenth percentile is $37,860 and the ninetieth is $77,510 — a wide band, and where you land in it depends on far more than the state.
- In Missouri the take-home figure of $44,384, from $54,550, 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 261 of 488 occupations here.
- Two cautions on $48,369, the adjusted value of that $54,550 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Missouri. 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 261 of 488 locally.
- The Missouri median of $54,550 describes the midpoint of a distribution spanning $37,860 to $77,510. 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 Missouri is computed for a single filer taking the standard deduction with no dependants and no pre-tax contributions, giving $44,384 from $54,550. 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 261 of 488 locally.
- This $48,369 adjusted figure, worked from $54,550, 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 261 of 488 in the state. The occupation ranks 261 of 488 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 $56,830 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 $37,860 and the top tenth $77,510 — experience, employer and specialism separate them, and a single figure hides all three.
What does this pay actually buy where I live?
A smaller wage in a cheaper place is not automatically less. Adjusted for local prices, this is worth $48,369.
Where does the difference between the wage and my paycheck go?
Into four separate taxes, not one. Federal income tax, Social Security and Medicare apply everywhere, and Missouri adds its own income tax on top — which is why $44,384 of this wage survives to your account.
Can I compare this job across every state?
This occupation is published everywhere — all 51 of them — so comparing states measures real differences rather than gaps in the data.
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 Missouri is $56,830. 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 ($37,860) and the ninetieth ($77,510) 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?
Missouri'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 $48,369 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 $44,384 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and Missouri 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.
Is this occupation's state coverage complete?
State-level estimates are published for all 51 jurisdictions for this occupation, so cross-state comparison is not confounded by suppression. ⚠️ Estimates remain survey-based and carry sampling error; small differences between adjacent states should not be over-read.