Materials Engineers in Virginia
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$84,992
after federal, FICA and Virginia tax
Tax takes
$31,728
27.2% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$84,360
Virginia costs more than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Virginia — 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
$116,720
Kept after tax
$84,992
Worth in national money
$84,360
State rank
16
of 45 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Middling, nationally. Virginia pays materials engineers around $116,720 at the midpoint, 16 of 45 states. The interesting numbers on this page are the two below it.
- Locally, this pays well. Among 489 occupations Virginia reports, materials engineers comes in at 53 — comfortably in the upper quarter.
- Cost of living is unremarkable here. From $116,720, tax leaves $84,992, and adjusting for local prices barely moves it — about $84,360 in comparable terms. Averages run higher here, $117,660, since top earners drag the number up.
- For materials engineers the Virginia median is $116,720, ranking 16 of 45 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.
- Materials engineers ranks 53 of 489 occupations by median in Virginia, in the top quartile. Within-state position is largely independent of national position, so this holds regardless of how the state compares to others for the same work.
- Because Virginia sits close to the national price level, the real-terms figure for materials engineers — median $116,720 — tracks the post-tax figure closely: $84,992 retained, $84,360 adjusted. ⚠️ Neither is a wage; the second describes what the first buys. Mean pay of $117,660 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
Compare this career across states
Choose your filing status and local taxes, compare pay, and keep a shortlist.Compare wage and personal-pay outcomes by state, with selected resident local taxes and saved career choices.
Pay band: Materials Engineers
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $77,490 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $116,720 |
| Top tenth earn over | $170,210 |
| This salary | $116,720 |
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 Virginia | $84,992 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $90,943 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$9,226 |
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 | $108,261 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$12,745 |
| 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 Virginia earn under $116,720 and half over. The published range runs $77,490 at the tenth percentile to $170,210 at the ninetieth. Experience and employer move an individual a long way inside that.
- In Virginia the take-home figure of $84,992, from $116,720, 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 53 of 489 occupations here.
- Two cautions on $84,360, the adjusted value of that $116,720 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Virginia. 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 53 of 489 locally.
- Figures are distribution medians for materials engineers in Virginia, not entry or offer rates. The published band runs $77,490 to $170,210; 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.
- Take-home for Virginia is computed for a single filer taking the standard deduction with no dependants and no pre-tax contributions, giving $84,992 from $116,720. 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 53 of 489 locally.
- This $84,360 adjusted figure, worked from $116,720, 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 53 of 489 in the state. The occupation ranks 53 of 489 locally.
Questions people ask
Why is the pay range for this job so wide?
The label is broader than the work. From $77,490 at the bottom tenth to $170,210 at the top, the same title covers roles that share little beyond a name.
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 $84,360 of national purchasing power.
Where does the difference between the wage and my paycheck go?
Into four separate taxes, not one. Federal income tax, Social Security and Medicare apply everywhere, and Virginia adds its own income tax on top — which is why $84,992 of this wage survives to your account.
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.
What drives the percentile dispersion in this occupation?
Dispersion between the tenth percentile ($77,490) and the ninetieth ($170,210) 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?
Virginia's regional price parity sits above the national average, so nominal wages overstate purchasing power. Deflating take-home by the state price level gives $84,360 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 $84,992 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and Virginia 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.