Office Clerks, General in Kentucky
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$31,401
after federal, FICA and Kentucky tax
Tax takes
$6,469
17.1% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$34,709
Kentucky costs less than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Kentucky — 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
$37,870
Kept after tax
$31,401
Worth in national money
$34,709
State rank
41
of 51 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- The nominal figure here is modest. Kentucky pays office clerks, general a middle wage of $37,870, 41 of 51 states and about 15.86% below the national middle. Hold that thought until the adjusted numbers.
- Within Kentucky this is lower-paid work. Of 491 occupations the state publishes figures for, office clerks, general ranks 409. That is the bottom quarter locally, whatever the national comparison says.
- Cheaper living works in this state's favor. From $37,870 you keep $31,401 after tax, and local prices stretch that to the equivalent of $34,709 at national prices. Averages run higher here, $39,310, since top earners drag the number up.
- Kentucky's $37,870 median for office clerks, general places it 41 of 51 states, about 15.86% 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.
- Against every occupation Kentucky reports, office clerks, general ranks 409 of 491, in the lowest quartile of the state's distribution. That position is set by the local labor market and is independent of how the state compares nationally for this work.
- Retained pay in Kentucky is $31,401 after the full tax stack, from $37,870. Because the state's price level runs below the national average, the price-adjusted equivalent is $34,709 — a real-terms figure describing purchasing power rather than compensation, and not a number that appears on any pay stub. Mean pay of $39,310 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
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Pay band: Office Clerks, General
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $22,640 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $37,870 |
| Top tenth earn over | $56,750 |
| This salary | $37,870 |
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 Kentucky | $31,401 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $32,609 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | −$1,153 |
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 | $36,367 |
|---|---|
| Raise you would need | +$1,394 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 90 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Half the people doing this work in Kentucky earn less than $37,870. The published range is $22,640 up to $56,750, so an individual figure can sit a long way from the middle in either direction.
- That $31,401 take-home in Kentucky comes from $37,870. 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 409 of 491.
- Two cautions on $34,709, the adjusted value of that $37,870 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Kentucky. 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 409 of 491 locally.
- Reported values are medians; for office clerks, general in Kentucky the tenth-to-ninetieth percentile band is $22,640 to $56,750. Neither the median nor the band is an offer rate, and neither accounts for hours, shift differentials or overtime.
- Retained pay of $31,401, from $37,870, assumes a single Kentucky 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 409 of 491 locally, and the state ranks 41 of 51 for it.
- This $34,709 adjusted figure, worked from $37,870, 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 409 of 491 in the state. The occupation ranks 409 of 491 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 $39,310 because a long tail of high pay lifts it, so the two answer different questions.
Why is the pay range for this job so wide?
One title, many jobs. The lowest tenth take $22,640, the highest tenth $56,750, and what separates them is experience, employer and what exactly the role does.
What does this pay actually buy where I live?
More than the figure suggests. Prices in Kentucky sit below the national level, so take-home here stretches like $34,709 would elsewhere. The wage is the same; the ground it covers is larger.
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 Kentucky adds its own income tax on top — which is why $31,401 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 Kentucky is $39,310. 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 ($22,640) and the ninetieth ($56,750) 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?
Kentucky'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 $34,709 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 $31,401 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and Kentucky 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.