Light Truck Drivers in Maine
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$36,289
after federal, FICA and Maine tax
Tax takes
$8,261
18.5% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$37,374
Maine costs less than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Maine — 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
$44,550
Kept after tax
$36,289
Worth in national money
$37,374
State rank
25
of 51 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Middling, nationally. Maine pays light truck drivers around $44,550 at the midpoint, 25 of 51 states. The interesting numbers on this page are the two below it.
- Against 484 occupations Maine publishes, light truck drivers lands at 404. That is the lower quarter. That is the comparison people actually feel, more than any national table.
- Cost of living is unremarkable here. From $44,550, tax leaves $36,289, and adjusting for local prices barely moves it — about $37,374 in comparable terms. Averages run higher here, $49,820, since top earners drag the number up.
- For light truck drivers the Maine median is $44,550, ranking 25 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 Maine, this work ranks 404 of 484 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 Maine sits close to the national price level, the real-terms figure for light truck drivers — median $44,550 — tracks the post-tax figure closely: $36,289 retained, $37,374 adjusted. ⚠️ Neither is a wage; the second describes what the first buys. Mean pay of $49,820 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Light Truck Drivers
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $31,310 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $44,550 |
| Top tenth earn over | $93,670 |
| This salary | $44,550 |
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 Maine | $36,289 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $37,976 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$1,706 |
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 | $42,450 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$2,063 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 97 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Half the people doing this work in Maine earn less than $44,550. The published range is $31,310 up to $93,670, so an individual figure can sit a long way from the middle in either direction.
- In Maine the take-home figure of $36,289, from $44,550, 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 404 of 484 occupations here.
- Two cautions on $37,374, the adjusted value of that $44,550 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Maine. 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 404 of 484 locally.
- Reported values are medians; for light truck drivers in Maine the tenth-to-ninetieth percentile band is $31,310 to $93,670. Neither the median nor the band is an offer rate, and neither accounts for hours, shift differentials or overtime.
- Take-home for Maine is computed for a single filer taking the standard deduction with no dependants and no pre-tax contributions, giving $36,289 from $44,550. 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 404 of 484 locally.
- This $37,374 adjusted figure, worked from $44,550, 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 404 of 484 in the state. The occupation ranks 404 of 484 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 $49,820 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?
One title, many jobs. The lowest tenth take $31,310, the highest tenth $93,670, 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 Maine sit below the national level, so take-home here stretches like $37,374 would elsewhere. The wage is the same; the ground it covers is larger.
Where does the difference between the wage and my paycheck go?
Four deductions, stacked. The federal layer and the two payroll taxes apply wherever you work; Maine then takes its own share, leaving $36,289.
Can I compare this job across every state?
All 51 jurisdictions report this work, which makes the ranking a like-for-like one.
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 Maine is $49,820. 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 ($31,310) and the ninetieth ($93,670) 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?
Maine'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 $37,374 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 $36,289 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and Maine 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.