Nursing Assistants in Washington
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$41,696
after federal, FICA and Washington tax
Tax takes
$7,484
15.2% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$38,408
Washington costs more than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Washington — 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
$49,180
Kept after tax
$41,696
Worth in national money
$38,408
State rank
2
of 51 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- This is a good state for the work. Washington pays nursing assistants a middle wage of $49,180, ranking 2 of 51 states and sitting about 16.37% above the national middle.
- Against 493 occupations Washington publishes, nursing assistants lands at 395. That is the lower quarter. That is the comparison people actually feel, more than any national table.
- Costs eat into it here. Of $49,180, tax leaves $41,696 — and because Washington is dearer than average, that stretches only as far as $38,408 would nationally. Averages run higher here, $52,230, since top earners drag the number up.
- Washington's median for nursing assistants is $49,180, about 16.37% above the national figure and 2 of 51 states reporting. Whether that premium reaches the worker depends on the two adjustments below, which is the part a wage table cannot tell you.
- Within Washington, this work ranks 395 of 493 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.
- After tax, $41,696 remains from the Washington median of $49,180 for this occupation. Applying the state's above-average price parity yields $38,408 in national-average terms — the quantity relevant to a relocation decision, and the one absent from essentially every published wage comparison. Mean pay of $52,230 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Nursing Assistants
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $42,500 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $49,180 |
| Top tenth earn over | $62,660 |
| This salary | $49,180 |
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 Washington | $41,696 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $41,696 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$4,501 |
The raise and the real gain point in opposite directions here.
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 | $49,180 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$5,443 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 109 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Half the people doing this work in Washington earn less than $49,180. The published range is $42,500 up to $62,660, so an individual figure can sit a long way from the middle in either direction.
- In Washington the take-home figure of $41,696, from $49,180, 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 395 of 493 occupations here.
- One number stands for prices across all of Washington, which is a simplification — big cities cost far more than small towns. Read $38,408, the adjusted value of that $49,180 median, as a way to compare states fairly, not as a quote for any particular place. The two datasets are also from different years. This job sits at 395 of 493 in the state.
- Reported values are medians; for nursing assistants in Washington the tenth-to-ninetieth percentile band is $42,500 to $62,660. Neither the median nor the band is an offer rate, and neither accounts for hours, shift differentials or overtime.
- Take-home for Washington is computed for a single filer taking the standard deduction with no dependants and no pre-tax contributions, giving $41,696 from $49,180. 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 395 of 493 locally.
- Price deflation uses one statewide parity for Washington, so $38,408 — the adjusted value of that $49,180 median — establishes comparability between states rather than accuracy within one. The wage and parity series are dated independently, each following its own publication cycle, and neither is projected forward. This occupation sits at 395 of 493 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 $52,230 because a long tail of high pay lifts it, so the two answer different questions.
How much does pay for this job actually vary?
The range here is narrow. From $42,500 at the bottom tenth to $62,660 at the top, pay for this work clusters rather than spreads.
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 $38,408 of national purchasing power.
Is most of this wage taxed away?
Most of it arrives. $41,696 lands after tax, since there is no state income tax on wages here — though the federal floor is identical in every state.
Can I compare this job across every state?
This occupation is published everywhere — all 51 of them — so comparing states measures real differences rather than gaps in the data.
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 Washington is $52,230. 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 ($42,500 to $62,660) sits at or below the family's median dispersion, indicating relatively standardized compensation. Percentiles are published per state, so this dispersion is specific to Washington rather than a national figure.
How does the state price level affect real compensation?
Washington's regional price parity sits above the national average, so nominal wages overstate purchasing power. Deflating take-home by the state price level gives $38,408 in national-average terms. ⚠️ RPPs are an all-items index; housing parities vary far more widely than the headline figure.
Why is the take-home ratio comparatively high in this state?
Washington levies no personal income tax on wages, so take-home of $41,696 reflects the federal layer and FICA alone. Federal income tax and FICA are unchanged; states without a wage income tax generally recover revenue through consumption and property bases instead.
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.