Interpreters and Translators in Texas
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$40,354
after federal, FICA and Texas tax
Tax takes
$7,156
15.1% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$41,527
Texas costs less than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Texas — 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
$47,510
Kept after tax
$40,354
Worth in national money
$41,527
State rank
44
of 47 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Texas is among the lower-paying states for interpreters and translators. The middle earner takes $47,510, ranking 44 of 47 states — about 21.04% below the national middle. Costs here are often lower too, which the figures further down account for.
- Against other work in Texas, this sits in the middle: 309 of 493 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 $47,510 the take-home is $40,354, which is worth about $41,527 in comparable money. Tax does most of the work here, not cost of living. The average is higher, $55,840, because the best-paid pull it up.
- Texas ranks 44 of 47 for interpreters and translators, with a median of $47,510 — about 21.04% 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.
- Interpreters and translators ranks 309 of 493 occupations in Texas 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.
- Texas's price level is near the national average, so price deflation is close to neutral for interpreters and translators on its $47,510 median: $40,354 retained after tax becomes $41,527 in national-average terms. Where the price adjustment is small, the tax stack is the dominant determinant of the real outcome. The mean of $55,840 sits above the median, the right skew typical of wage data.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Interpreters and Translators
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $31,500 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $47,510 |
| Top tenth earn over | $89,140 |
| This salary | $47,510 |
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 Texas | $40,354 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Florida | $40,354 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | −$2,520 |
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 | $47,510 |
|---|---|
| Raise you would need | +$3,244 |
| Prices in Florida | 103 vs 97 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Treat $47,510 as a midpoint for Texas, not a promise. The tenth percentile is $31,500 and the ninetieth is $89,140 — a wide band, and where you land in it depends on far more than the state.
- One filer, no dependants, no pension contributions — that is the household behind Texas's $40,354, worked from $47,510. 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 309 of 493.
- One number stands for prices across all of Texas, which is a simplification — big cities cost far more than small towns. Read $41,527, the adjusted value of that $47,510 median, as a way to compare states fairly, not as a quote for any particular place. The two datasets are also from different years. This job sits at 309 of 493 in the state.
- The Texas median of $47,510 describes the midpoint of a distribution spanning $31,500 to $89,140. Because that spread is typically larger than the interstate spread, a state median is a weak predictor for any individual worker in this occupation.
- The Texas take-home of $40,354, on $47,510 for work ranking 309 of 493 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 309 of 493 in the state.
- Price deflation uses one statewide parity for Texas, so $41,527 — the adjusted value of that $47,510 median — establishes comparability between states rather than accuracy within one. The wage and parity series are dated independently, each following its own publication cycle, and neither is projected forward. This occupation sits at 309 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 $55,840, 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 $31,500, the highest tenth $89,140, and what separates them is experience, employer and what exactly the role does.
What does this pay actually buy where I live?
More than the figure suggests. Prices in Texas sit below the national level, so take-home here stretches like $41,527 would elsewhere. The wage is the same; the ground it covers is larger.
Is most of this wage taxed away?
Less than people assume. $40,354 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 47 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 $55,840. 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 ($31,500) and the ninetieth ($89,140) 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?
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 $41,527 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 $40,354 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 47 of the fifty-one jurisdictions. Suppression reflects sample size and confidentiality rules, and cannot be read as an absence of employment.