Materials Engineers in Rhode Island
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$67,312
after federal, FICA and Rhode Island tax
Tax takes
$19,868
22.8% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$66,375
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
$87,180
Kept after tax
$67,312
Worth in national money
$66,375
State rank
42
of 45 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Rhode Island is among the lower-paying states for materials engineers. The middle earner takes $87,180, ranking 42 of 45 states — about 22.75% 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: 122 of 452 occupations with published pay. Solidly ordinary for the state, which is not the same as ordinary nationally.
- Cost of living is unremarkable here. From $87,180, tax leaves $67,312, and adjusting for local prices barely moves it — about $66,375 in comparable terms. Averages run higher here, $98,270, since top earners drag the number up.
- Rhode Island ranks 42 of 45 for materials engineers, with a median of $87,180 — about 22.75% 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.
- Materials engineers ranks 122 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.
- Because Rhode Island sits close to the national price level, the real-terms figure for materials engineers — median $87,180 — tracks the post-tax figure closely: $67,312 retained, $66,375 adjusted. ⚠️ Neither is a wage; the second describes what the first buys. Mean pay of $98,270 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
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Pay band: Materials Engineers
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $78,270 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $87,180 |
| Top tenth earn over | $140,450 |
| This salary | $87,180 |
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 | $67,312 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $70,161 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$5,826 |
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 | $83,130 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$8,048 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 101 |
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 materials engineers in Rhode Island earn under $87,180 and half over. The published range runs $78,270 at the tenth percentile to $140,450 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 Rhode Island's $67,312, worked from $87,180. 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 122 of 452.
- Two cautions on $66,375, the adjusted value of that $87,180 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 122 of 452 locally.
- Figures are distribution medians for materials engineers in Rhode Island, not entry or offer rates. The published band runs $78,270 to $140,450; 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 Rhode Island take-home of $67,312, on $87,180 for work ranking 122 of 452 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 122 of 452 in the state.
- This $66,375 adjusted figure, worked from $87,180, 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 122 of 452 in the state. The occupation ranks 122 of 452 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 $98,270 because a long tail of high pay lifts it, so the two answer different questions.
How much does pay for this job actually vary?
Less than you might expect. The bottom tenth earn $78,270 and the top tenth $140,450, so most people doing this work in Rhode Island sit within a fairly tight band.
Does a bigger number here mean I am better off?
A larger wage in a dearer place is not automatically more. Adjusted for local prices, this pay behaves like $66,375 of national purchasing power.
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; Rhode Island then takes its own share, leaving $67,312.
Why is this job missing from some states?
A blank is a suppression, not a zero. 45 states have a published figure for this work; the others had too few responses to release 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 Rhode Island is $98,270. 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 ($78,270 to $140,450) sits at or below the family's median dispersion, indicating relatively standardized compensation. Percentiles are published per state, so this dispersion is specific to Rhode Island rather than a national figure.
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 $66,375 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 $67,312 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 45 of the fifty-one jurisdictions. Suppression reflects sample size and confidentiality rules, and cannot be read as an absence of employment.