Physical Therapist Assistants in Oregon

A stethoscope and folded scrubs in a sunlit clinical workspace.

May 2025 wages · tax year 2026

You keep

$54,459

after federal, FICA and Oregon tax

Tax takes

$18,721

25.6% of the whole

Worth, in national money

$52,004

Oregon costs more than average

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

$73,180

Kept after tax

$54,459

Worth in national money

$52,004

State rank

11

of 51 states

What this pays, and what it is worth

  • Oregon is one of the better-paying states for physical therapist assistants. The middle earner takes $73,180, which ranks 11 of 51 states with published figures. That is about 7.02% above the national middle.
  • Against other work in Oregon, this sits in the middle: 208 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 $73,180, tax leaves $54,459 — and because Oregon is dearer than average, that stretches only as far as $52,004 would nationally. Here the average runs under the middle, at $70,490.
  • Oregon ranks 11 of 51 states publishing a median for physical therapist assistants, at $73,180 — about 7.02% above the national median. A state's position on nominal pay is the figure wage tables report and the least informative of the three on this page, because it survives neither the tax adjustment nor the price adjustment intact for most occupations.
  • Physical therapist assistants ranks 208 of 489 occupations in Oregon 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, $54,459 remains from the Oregon median of $73,180 for this occupation. Applying the state's above-average price parity yields $52,004 in national-average terms — the quantity relevant to a relocation decision, and the one absent from essentially every published wage comparison. Mean pay of $70,490 sits under the median, so the lower tail is the longer one.

Compare this career across states

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Pay band: Physical Therapist Assistants

The state median for this job

50thpercentile, roughly
Lowest tenth earn under$56,620
Half earn under$73,180
Top tenth earn over$89,480
This salary$73,180

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

Compare with
+$5,853take-home per year in Texas
Take-home in Oregon$54,459
Take-home in Texas$60,312
Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity+$10,062

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

Moving to
$0now · $73,180$60,180
$60,180in Texas, for the same life
To match take-home only$65,064
You could take a cut of−$13,000
Prices in Texas97 vs 105

State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.

Sources and assumptions
  • A median is the middle, not an offer. Half of physical therapist assistants in Oregon earn under $73,180 and half over. The published range runs $56,620 at the tenth percentile to $89,480 at the ninetieth. Experience and employer move an individual a long way inside that.
  • In Oregon the take-home figure of $54,459, from $73,180, 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 208 of 489 occupations here.
  • The wage data and the price data come from different years. That is how each is published. The price adjustment behind $52,004 uses one figure for the whole of Oregon. 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 208.
  • Figures are distribution medians for physical therapist assistants in Oregon, not entry or offer rates. The published band runs $56,620 to $89,480; within-state dispersion of that width routinely exceeds the dispersion between states, so tenure, employer and metropolitan area predict an individual's pay better than geography does.
  • Take-home for Oregon is computed for a single filer taking the standard deduction with no dependants and no pre-tax contributions, giving $54,459 from $73,180. 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 208 of 489 locally.
  • Wage and price series carry different reference periods, each published on its own schedule. The real-terms figure of $52,004, worked from $73,180, 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 Oregon address, on work sitting at 208 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 $70,490 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 $56,620 at the bottom tenth to $89,480 at the top, pay for this work clusters rather than spreads.

Does a bigger number here mean I am better off?

The number and the value are different things. Oregon costs more than the national average, so this take-home stretches like $52,004 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 Oregon adds its own income tax on top — which is why $54,459 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 Oregon is $70,490. 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 ($56,620 to $89,480) sits at or below the family's median dispersion, indicating relatively standardized compensation. Percentiles are published per state, so this dispersion is specific to Oregon rather than a national figure.

How does the state price level affect real compensation?

Oregon's regional price parity sits above the national average, so nominal wages overstate purchasing power. Deflating take-home by the state price level gives $52,004 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 $54,459 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and Oregon 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.