Occupational Therapy Assistants in Colorado
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$59,225
after federal, FICA and Colorado tax
Tax takes
$16,115
21.4% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$58,418
Colorado costs more than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Colorado — 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
$75,340
Kept after tax
$59,225
Worth in national money
$58,418
State rank
11
of 50 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- This is a good state for the work. Colorado pays this job a middle wage of $75,340, ranking 11 of 50 states and sitting about 4.2% above the national middle.
- Against other work in Colorado, this sits in the middle: 176 of 491 occupations with published pay. Solidly ordinary for the state, which is not the same as ordinary nationally.
- Cost of living is unremarkable here. From $75,340, tax leaves $59,225, and adjusting for local prices barely moves it — about $58,418 in comparable terms. Averages run higher here, $76,690, since top earners drag the number up.
- Colorado's median for occupational therapy assistants is $75,340, about 4.2% above the national figure and 11 of 50 states reporting. Whether that premium reaches the worker depends on the two adjustments below, which is the part a wage table cannot tell you.
- Occupational therapy assistants ranks 176 of 491 occupations in Colorado 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 Colorado sits close to the national price level, the real-terms figure for occupational therapy assistants — median $75,340 — tracks the post-tax figure closely: $59,225 retained, $58,418 adjusted. ⚠️ Neither is a wage; the second describes what the first buys. Mean pay of $76,690 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Occupational Therapy Assistants
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $60,880 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $75,340 |
| Top tenth earn over | $100,190 |
| This salary | $75,340 |
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 Colorado | $59,225 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $61,832 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$5,211 |
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 | $71,635 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$7,199 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 101 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Half the people doing this work in Colorado earn less than $75,340. The published range is $60,880 up to $100,190, 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 Colorado's $59,225, worked from $75,340. 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 176 of 491.
- One number stands for prices across all of Colorado, which is a simplification — big cities cost far more than small towns. Read $58,418, the adjusted value of that $75,340 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 176 of 491 in the state.
- Reported values are medians; for occupational therapy assistants in Colorado the tenth-to-ninetieth percentile band is $60,880 to $100,190. Neither the median nor the band is an offer rate, and neither accounts for hours, shift differentials or overtime.
- The Colorado take-home of $59,225, on $75,340 for work ranking 176 of 491 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 176 of 491 in the state.
- Price deflation uses one statewide parity for Colorado, so $58,418 — the adjusted value of that $75,340 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 176 of 491 locally.
Questions people ask
How much does pay for this job actually vary?
Most of these jobs pay within a close range — $60,880 at the tenth percentile, $100,190 at the ninetieth.
Does a bigger number here mean I am better off?
The number and the value are different things. Colorado costs more than the national average, so this take-home stretches like $58,418 rather than its face figure.
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 Colorado adds its own income tax on top — which is why $59,225 of this wage survives to your account.
Why is this job missing from some states?
A blank is a suppression, not a zero. 50 states have a published figure for this work; the others had too few responses to release one.
What is the dispersion of this occupation's wage distribution?
The tenth-to-ninetieth percentile span ($60,880 to $100,190) sits at or below the family's median dispersion, indicating relatively standardized compensation. Percentiles are published per state, so this dispersion is specific to Colorado rather than a national figure.
How does the state price level affect real compensation?
Colorado's regional price parity sits above the national average, so nominal wages overstate purchasing power. Deflating take-home by the state price level gives $58,418 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 $59,225 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and Colorado 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 50 of the fifty-one jurisdictions. Suppression reflects sample size and confidentiality rules, and cannot be read as an absence of employment.