Hotel, Motel, and Resort Desk Clerks in Illinois
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$29,024
after federal, FICA and Illinois tax
Tax takes
$6,386
18.0% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$29,360
Illinois costs less than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Illinois — 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
$35,410
Kept after tax
$29,024
Worth in national money
$29,360
State rank
22
of 51 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Middling, nationally. Illinois pays hotel, motel, and resort desk clerks around $35,410 at the midpoint, 22 of 51 states. The interesting numbers on this page are the two below it.
- Against 494 occupations Illinois publishes, hotel, motel, and resort desk clerks lands at 476. That is the lower quarter. That is the comparison people actually feel, more than any national table.
- Cost of living is unremarkable here. From $35,410, tax leaves $29,024, and adjusting for local prices barely moves it — about $29,360 in comparable terms. Averages run higher here, $36,810, since top earners drag the number up.
- For hotel, motel, and resort desk clerks the Illinois median is $35,410, ranking 22 of 51 states reporting. Mid-band nominal positions are the ones most frequently reordered by the adjustments, because no large wage premium exists to absorb a state's tax or price level.
- Within Illinois, this work ranks 476 of 494 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 Illinois sits close to the national price level, the real-terms figure for hotel, motel, and resort desk clerks — median $35,410 — tracks the post-tax figure closely: $29,024 retained, $29,360 adjusted. ⚠️ Neither is a wage; the second describes what the first buys. Mean pay of $36,810 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Hotel, Motel, and Resort Desk Clerks
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $31,200 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $35,410 |
| Top tenth earn over | $44,900 |
| This salary | $35,410 |
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 Illinois | $29,024 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $30,632 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$2,162 |
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 | $33,409 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$2,615 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 99 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- A median is the middle, not an offer. Half of hotel, motel, and resort desk clerks in Illinois earn under $35,410 and half over. The published range runs $31,200 at the tenth percentile to $44,900 at the ninetieth. Experience and employer move an individual a long way inside that.
- One filer, no dependants, no pension contributions — that is the household behind Illinois's $29,024, worked from $35,410. 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 476 of 494.
- The wage data and the price data come from different years. That is how each is published. The price adjustment behind $29,360 uses one figure for the whole of Illinois. A city and a rural county there can differ by more than two states do. Out of 494 occupations the state publishes, this one sits at 476.
- Figures are distribution medians for hotel, motel, and resort desk clerks in Illinois, not entry or offer rates. The published band runs $31,200 to $44,900; within-state dispersion of that width routinely exceeds the dispersion between states, so tenure, employer and metropolitan area predict an individual's pay better than geography does.
- The Illinois take-home of $29,024, on $35,410 for work ranking 476 of 494 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 476 of 494 in the state.
- Wage and price series carry different reference periods, each published on its own schedule. The real-terms figure of $29,360, worked from $35,410, deflates by a statewide parity that conceals substantial intra-state variation, concentrated in housing — so it supports comparison between states rather than the pricing of a move to a particular Illinois address, on work sitting at 476 of 494 locally.
Questions people ask
Is this the average pay for the job?
It is the midpoint, not the average. The average here is $36,810, dragged up by high earners; the middle figure describes a typical worker better.
How much does pay for this job actually vary?
Less than you might expect. The bottom tenth earn $31,200 and the top tenth $44,900, so most people doing this work in Illinois sit within a fairly tight band.
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 $29,360.
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 Illinois's own levy, $29,024 remains.
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 Illinois is $36,810. 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 ($31,200 to $44,900) sits at or below the family's median dispersion, indicating relatively standardized compensation. Percentiles are published per state, so this dispersion is specific to Illinois rather than a national figure.
What is this occupation's price-adjusted compensation in this state?
Illinois'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 $29,360 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 $29,024 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and Illinois 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.