Nursing Instructors and Teachers, Postsecondary in Missouri
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$59,885
after federal, FICA and Missouri tax
Tax takes
$16,455
21.6% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$65,261
Missouri costs less than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Missouri — 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
$76,340
Kept after tax
$59,885
Worth in national money
$65,261
State rank
41
of 51 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- The nominal figure here is modest. Missouri pays this job a middle wage of $76,340, 41 of 51 states and about 4.87% below the national middle. Hold that thought until the adjusted numbers.
- Locally, this pays well. Among 488 occupations Missouri reports, this job comes in at 117 — comfortably in the upper quarter.
- Here is where Missouri does better than its wage suggests. From a median of $76,340 you keep $59,885, and because things cost less here than the national average, that behaves like $65,261 would elsewhere. The average is higher, $80,930, because the best-paid pull it up.
- Missouri's $76,340 median for nursing instructors and teachers, postsecondary places it 41 of 51 states, about 4.87% below national. Because both the tax and price adjustments tend to favor lower-nominal states, this ranking is the least stable of the three reported here.
- Nursing instructors and teachers, postsecondary ranks 117 of 488 occupations by median in Missouri, 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.
- After federal, FICA and Missouri income tax, retained pay for nursing instructors and teachers, postsecondary on $76,340 is $59,885. Deflating by the state's price level — below the national average — gives $65,261 in national-average terms. ⚠️ That figure is purchasing power, not a wage, and nobody is paid it; it is what the take-home buys. The mean of $80,930 sits above the median, the right skew typical of wage data.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Nursing Instructors and Teachers, Postsecondary
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $48,610 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $76,340 |
| Top tenth earn over | $119,050 |
| This salary | $76,340 |
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 Missouri | $59,885 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $62,535 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | −$908 |
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 | $72,572 |
|---|---|
| Raise you would need | +$1,254 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 92 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Treat $76,340 as a midpoint for Missouri, not a promise. The tenth percentile is $48,610 and the ninetieth is $119,050 — a wide band, and where you land in it depends on far more than the state.
- That $59,885 take-home in Missouri comes from $76,340. It is the no-frills case: single filer, standard deduction, nothing set aside before tax. Real circumstances almost always reduce the tax. City and school-district taxes are not counted at all. Locally the work ranks 117 of 488.
- One number stands for prices across all of Missouri, which is a simplification — big cities cost far more than small towns. Read $65,261, the adjusted value of that $76,340 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 117 of 488 in the state.
- The Missouri median of $76,340 describes the midpoint of a distribution spanning $48,610 to $119,050. Because that spread is typically larger than the interstate spread, a state median is a weak predictor for any individual worker in this occupation.
- Retained pay of $59,885, from $76,340, assumes a single Missouri filer with the standard deduction and no elective deferrals. Pre-tax retirement or HSA contributions, dependants and itemized deductions all reduce it further; local income taxes, excluded here, would increase it in the states that levy them. This occupation ranks 117 of 488 locally, and the state ranks 41 of 51 for it.
- Price deflation uses one statewide parity for Missouri, so $65,261 — the adjusted value of that $76,340 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 117 of 488 locally.
Questions people ask
Is this the average pay for the job?
No — it is the middle. Half of these workers earn more and half earn less. The average is $80,930, pulled upward by the top of the range, which is why the middle is the fairer number to plan against.
Why is the pay range for this job so wide?
The label is broader than the work. From $48,610 at the bottom tenth to $119,050 at the top, the same title covers roles that share little beyond a name.
What does this pay actually buy where I live?
A smaller wage in a cheaper place is not automatically less. Adjusted for local prices, this is worth $65,261.
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 Missouri adds its own income tax on top — which is why $59,885 of this wage survives to your account.
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 Missouri is $80,930. 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 ($48,610) and the ninetieth ($119,050) 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?
Missouri'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 $65,261 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 $59,885 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and Missouri 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.