Interior Designers in Rhode Island
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$47,105
after federal, FICA and Rhode Island tax
Tax takes
$10,995
18.9% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$46,449
Rhode Island costs more than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Rhode Island — 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
$58,100
Kept after tax
$47,105
Worth in national money
$46,449
State rank
46
of 49 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Rhode Island is among the lower-paying states for interior designers. The middle earner takes $58,100, ranking 46 of 49 states — about 13.53% below the national middle. Costs here are often lower too, which the figures further down account for.
- Against other work in Rhode Island, this sits in the middle: 271 of 452 occupations with published pay. Solidly ordinary for the state, which is not the same as ordinary nationally.
- Prices here sit close to the national average, so the adjustment changes little. From $58,100 the take-home is $47,105, which is worth about $46,449 in comparable money. Tax does most of the work here, not cost of living. The average is higher, $67,150, because the best-paid pull it up.
- Rhode Island ranks 46 of 49 for interior designers, with a median of $58,100 — about 13.53% 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.
- Interior designers ranks 271 of 452 occupations in Rhode Island by median pay, in the middle bands. Within-state and national positions are separate measurements and a job commonly sits in different quartiles on each.
- Rhode Island's price level is near the national average, so price deflation is close to neutral for interior designers on its $58,100 median: $47,105 retained after tax becomes $46,449 in national-average terms. Where the price adjustment is small, the tax stack is the dominant determinant of the real outcome. The mean of $67,150 sits above the median, the right skew typical of wage data.
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Pay band: Interior Designers
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $50,270 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $58,100 |
| Top tenth earn over | $99,990 |
| This salary | $58,100 |
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 Rhode Island | $47,105 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $48,863 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$3,835 |
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 | $55,911 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$4,638 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 101 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Half the people doing this work in Rhode Island earn less than $58,100. The published range is $50,270 up to $99,990, so an individual figure can sit a long way from the middle in either direction.
- That $47,105 take-home in Rhode Island comes from $58,100. 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 271 of 452.
- Two cautions on $46,449, the adjusted value of that $58,100 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Rhode Island. 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 271 of 452 locally.
- Reported values are medians; for interior designers in Rhode Island the tenth-to-ninetieth percentile band is $50,270 to $99,990. Neither the median nor the band is an offer rate, and neither accounts for hours, shift differentials or overtime.
- Retained pay of $47,105, from $58,100, assumes a single Rhode Island 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 271 of 452 locally, and the state ranks 46 of 49 for it.
- This $46,449 adjusted figure, worked from $58,100, 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 271 of 452 in the state. The occupation ranks 271 of 452 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 $67,150, pulled upward by the top of the range, which is why the middle is the fairer number to plan against.
Why is the pay range for this job so wide?
One title, many jobs. The lowest tenth take $50,270, the highest tenth $99,990, and what separates them is experience, employer and what exactly the role does.
Does a bigger number here mean I am better off?
Not on its own. Prices in Rhode Island run above the national level, so the same dollars buy less here. Adjusted for that, this pay is worth $46,449 — the wage did not change, only what it covers.
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 Rhode Island's own levy, $47,105 remains.
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 49 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 Rhode Island is $67,150. 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 ($50,270) and the ninetieth ($99,990) 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?
Rhode Island's regional price parity sits above the national average, so nominal wages overstate purchasing power. Deflating take-home by the state price level gives $46,449 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 $47,105 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and Rhode Island 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 49 of the fifty-one jurisdictions. Suppression reflects sample size and confidentiality rules, and cannot be read as an absence of employment.