Laborers and Freight, Stock, and Material Movers, Hand
What the pay figures show
- A job board will not tell you this about this job. The best headline number is Minnesota, at $46,280. State taxes differ, so Washington leaves you more. Prices differ too, so North Dakota leaves you better off again — $43,910 once levelled out. Moving for the biggest salary can leave you worse off.
- Wage data for laborers and freight, stock, and material movers, hand places Minnesota first at $46,280. That position is not robust: state income tax alone reorders it to Washington, and regional price parity reorders it again to North Dakota at $43,910. Because published comparisons almost universally stop at the nominal median, the state that appears best for this occupation is routinely not the state where a worker's income goes furthest.
Compare this career across states
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Pay by state · May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
National median
$40,240
People doing it
2,950,280
Highest paid
$46,280
MN
Best off, really
$43,910
ND, after tax and prices
Lowest tenth
$31,270
Highest tenth
$55,140
Lowest, really
$30,569
NJ
States with data
51
National average
$42,260
mean, not median
Prices where it goes furthest
88.57%
ND, against a national 100
Where this job actually pays best
- Pay for this job is fairly steady around the country. Count tax and local prices and the states bunch closer still, from $30,569 to $43,910. For work like this, where you live changes your life more than it changes your pay.
- About 2,950,280 people in the country do this job. Very few jobs are this big. That is part of why its geography is worth setting out with care.
- No gaps here — all 51 jurisdictions publish a number for this job, which sits at $40,240 in the middle.
- Geographic dispersion in laborers and freight, stock, and material movers, hand is moderate by national standards. Tax and price adjustment compress the distribution further, to a real range of $30,569 through $43,910. Where nominal spread is this contained, relocation decisions in the occupation turn on non-wage factors, because the wage differential does not survive the adjustments in a form large enough to drive them.
- 2,950,280 workers are employed nationally in laborers and freight, stock, and material movers, hand. At this scale the occupation's wage geography is a macroeconomic fact as much as a career one, and small per-worker differentials aggregate into substantial regional flows.
- 51 jurisdictions report laborers and freight, stock, and material movers, hand, giving full coverage. The extremes quoted above are therefore the true reported maximum and minimum.
Pay band: Laborers and Freight, Stock, and Material Movers, Hand
The national median for this job
50thpercentile, roughly
| Lowest tenth earn under | $31,270 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $40,240 |
| Top tenth earn over | $55,140 |
| This salary | $40,240 |
Positions between the published tenth, quarter, half, three-quarter and ninetieth points are estimated by straight line.
Where these numbers come from
| BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS), May 2025 estimates, time-series bulk download (oe.data.0.Current) | as of 2025-05-01 |
|---|
Steps in Laborers and Freight, Stock, and Material Movers, Hand
The national median for this job
$40,240around the 50th percentile
| Lowest tenth | $31,270 |
|---|---|
| Middle | $40,240 |
| Top tenth | $55,140 |
The five points BLS publishes. Nothing between them is invented.
Laborers and Freight, Stock, and Material Movers, Hand, state by state
The national median for this job
51states publish pay for this job
| Lowest | Louisiana · $35,340 |
|---|---|
| Highest | Minnesota · $46,280 |
| Spread | $10,940 |
One dot per state that publishes this job. A missing state means suppressed data, not zero pay.
Best paid, and best off
The national median for this job
| Texas pays | $37,540 |
|---|---|
| Worth, after local prices | $38,631 |
Median pay against the same pay once BEA price parities are applied.
Every state, three ways
Sorted by what the money is actually worth. "Kept" is take-home for a single filer after federal, FICA and state income tax. "Really worth" divides that by the state's own price level, so a dollar in each row buys the same thing. Tap a state to put your own salary into it. States BLS does not publish for this job are absent — that means no published figure, not no work.
| State | Median pay | Kept after tax | Really worth |
|---|---|---|---|
| ND | $45,690 | $38,892 | $43,910 |
| IA | $43,490 | $36,083 | $40,650 |
| MT | $43,840 | $36,102 | $40,004 |
| WI | $44,610 | $36,678 | $39,398 |
| NE | $42,910 | $35,409 | $39,180 |
| KY | $42,770 | $35,166 | $38,872 |
| MN | $46,280 | $37,709 | $38,315 |
| SD | $38,980 | $33,500 | $38,028 |
| AK | $44,510 | $37,944 | $37,304 |
| IN | $41,340 | $34,207 | $37,107 |
| CO | $45,370 | $37,347 | $36,838 |
| AZ | $44,290 | $37,062 | $36,657 |
| OH | $39,460 | $33,517 | $36,506 |
| WY | $38,330 | $32,978 | $36,300 |
| KS | $40,250 | $32,563 | $36,196 |
| WA | $46,190 | $39,294 | $36,195 |
| UT | $42,370 | $34,339 | $36,145 |
| ID | $39,900 | $32,978 | $36,071 |
| ME | $42,640 | $34,879 | $35,922 |
| PA | $42,480 | $35,009 | $35,906 |
| MO | $39,080 | $32,681 | $35,615 |
| TN | $38,160 | $32,842 | $35,499 |
| AR | $35,920 | $30,171 | $34,877 |
| NV | $39,350 | $33,798 | $34,850 |
| OK | $36,990 | $30,737 | $34,816 |
| NM | $37,230 | $31,461 | $34,807 |
| WV | $36,990 | $30,953 | $34,480 |
| MS | $36,400 | $30,063 | $34,440 |
| CT | $43,640 | $35,576 | $34,310 |
| SC | $37,530 | $31,887 | $34,222 |
| NH | $42,110 | $36,015 | $34,188 |
| RI | $41,690 | $34,535 | $34,054 |
| MI | $38,860 | $32,003 | $33,979 |
| VT | $39,390 | $32,767 | $33,908 |
| NC | $38,230 | $31,881 | $33,866 |
| LA | $35,340 | $29,902 | $33,847 |
| DC | $45,740 | $37,354 | $33,711 |
| NY | $44,630 | $36,227 | $33,660 |
| MA | $44,920 | $36,347 | $33,581 |
| AL | $36,670 | $30,087 | $33,441 |
| TX | $37,540 | $32,343 | $33,284 |
| IL | $40,550 | $32,899 | $33,281 |
| OR | $44,750 | $34,771 | $33,204 |
| CA | $44,710 | $37,180 | $33,025 |
| GA | $38,480 | $31,777 | $32,862 |
| HI | $44,120 | $35,687 | $32,859 |
| MD | $41,600 | $33,993 | $32,697 |
| VA | $39,380 | $32,318 | $32,078 |
| FL | $38,160 | $32,842 | $31,746 |
| DE | $37,320 | $30,662 | $30,893 |
| NJ | $39,540 | $33,284 | $30,569 |
Sources and assumptions
- These are middle-of-the-range figures for this job, not what a new starter is offered. Half the people doing this job earn under $40,240 nationally, half over. Your own experience and employer will move you well away from that midpoint in either direction.
- One filer, no dependants, nothing paid into a pension before tax — that is the household behind every take-home figure for this job. It is the simplest case on purpose, so the states can be compared against each other rather than against each other's family circumstances. City income taxes are not counted. On that household, Washington keeps the most at $39,294.
- The price adjustment for this job uses a statewide figure, and states are not uniform. A city and a rural county in the same state can differ more from each other than two states do, so treat the real-terms comparison as a direction rather than a precise answer — New Jersey anchors the bottom at $30,569. The wage data and the price data also come from different years, because that is how each is published.
- All wage figures for laborers and freight, stock, and material movers, hand are medians rather than entry or offer rates; the national median is $40,240. Within-state dispersion typically exceeds between-state dispersion in this data, so an individual's expected wage is determined more by experience, sector and employer than by the state comparisons presented here.
- The household modeled for laborers and freight, stock, and material movers, hand is a single filer, standard deduction, no dependants, no pre-tax contributions. Holding the household constant is what makes the interstate comparison meaningful; it also means the absolute figures overstate liability for most real filers. On that basis Washington retains the most, $39,294. Municipal and school-district income taxes are not included in any state.
- Real-terms figures for laborers and freight, stock, and material movers, hand deflate take-home by a statewide regional price parity, which conceals substantial intra-state variation — metropolitan and non-metropolitan price levels within one state frequently differ by more than two states differ from each other. The wage and price series also carry different reference periods, as each is published on its own schedule, so the adjustment is directionally sound rather than precisely dated.