Molding, Coremaking, and Casting Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Metal and Plastic in Maryland
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$50,519
after federal, FICA and Maryland tax
Tax takes
$12,941
20.4% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$48,593
Maryland costs more than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Maryland — 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
$63,460
Kept after tax
$50,519
Worth in national money
$48,593
State rank
2
of 49 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Pay for this job is strong here. Maryland's middle earner gets $63,460, putting the state 2 of 49 — about 43.09% ahead of the national figure.
- Against other work in Maryland, this sits in the middle: 239 of 489 occupations with published pay. Solidly ordinary for the state, which is not the same as ordinary nationally.
- Costs eat into it here. Of $63,460, tax leaves $50,519 — and because Maryland is dearer than average, that stretches only as far as $48,593 would nationally. Here the average runs under the middle, at $59,030.
- For molding, coremaking, and casting machine setters, operators, and tenders, metal and plastic, Maryland sits in the upper band nationally: a median of $63,460, ranking 2 of 49 and running about 43.09% above the national midpoint. Nominal advantage of this size is usually, though not always, large enough to survive the state's own tax and price levels.
- Molding, coremaking, and casting machine setters, operators, and tenders, metal and plastic ranks 239 of 489 occupations in Maryland 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.
- After tax, $50,519 remains from the Maryland median of $63,460 for this occupation. Applying the state's above-average price parity yields $48,593 in national-average terms — the quantity relevant to a relocation decision, and the one absent from essentially every published wage comparison. Mean pay of $59,030 sits under the median, so the lower tail is the longer one.
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Pay band: Molding, Coremaking, and Casting Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Metal and Plastic
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $36,630 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $63,460 |
| Top tenth earn over | $73,060 |
| This salary | $63,460 |
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 Maryland | $50,519 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $53,170 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$6,123 |
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 | $60,161 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$7,405 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 104 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Half the people doing this work in Maryland earn less than $63,460. The published range is $36,630 up to $73,060, so an individual figure can sit a long way from the middle in either direction.
- One filer, no dependants, no pension contributions — that is the household behind Maryland's $50,519, worked from $63,460. 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 239 of 489.
- The wage data and the price data come from different years. That is how each is published. The price adjustment behind $48,593 uses one figure for the whole of Maryland. A city and a rural county there can differ by more than two states do. Out of 489 occupations the state publishes, this one sits at 239.
- Reported values are medians; for molding, coremaking, and casting machine setters, operators, and tenders, metal and plastic in Maryland the tenth-to-ninetieth percentile band is $36,630 to $73,060. Neither the median nor the band is an offer rate, and neither accounts for hours, shift differentials or overtime.
- The Maryland take-home of $50,519, on $63,460 for work ranking 239 of 489 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 239 of 489 in the state.
- Wage and price series carry different reference periods, each published on its own schedule. The real-terms figure of $48,593, worked from $63,460, deflates by a statewide parity that conceals substantial intra-state variation, concentrated in housing — so it supports comparison between states rather than the pricing of a move to a particular Maryland address, on work sitting at 239 of 489 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 $59,030 because a long tail of high pay lifts it, so the two answer different questions.
How much does pay for this job actually vary?
Most of these jobs pay within a close range — $36,630 at the tenth percentile, $73,060 at the ninetieth.
Does a bigger number here mean I am better off?
Not on its own. Prices in Maryland run above the national level, so the same dollars buy less here. Adjusted for that, this pay is worth $48,593 — the wage did not change, only what it covers.
Where does the difference between the wage and my paycheck go?
Three of them are federal and one is not. After income tax, Social Security, Medicare and Maryland's own levy, $50,519 remains.
Why is this job missing from some states?
Because the survey suppresses a figure when too few employers report it. This occupation has published pay in 49 states — the rest are withheld to protect confidentiality, which is not the same as nobody doing the work there.
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 Maryland is $59,030. 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 ($36,630 to $73,060) sits at or below the family's median dispersion, indicating relatively standardized compensation. Percentiles are published per state, so this dispersion is specific to Maryland rather than a national figure.
How does the state price level affect real compensation?
Maryland's regional price parity sits above the national average, so nominal wages overstate purchasing power. Deflating take-home by the state price level gives $48,593 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 $50,519 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and Maryland 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 49 of the fifty-one jurisdictions. Suppression reflects sample size and confidentiality rules, and cannot be read as an absence of employment.