Postal Service Clerks in Washington
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$51,651
after federal, FICA and Washington tax
Tax takes
$9,919
16.1% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$47,578
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
$61,570
Kept after tax
$51,651
Worth in national money
$47,578
State rank
29
of 51 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Washington sits in the middle of the pack for postal service clerks. The median is $61,570, ranking 29 of 51 states with figures. Close enough to the national middle that where you live matters more than the headline suggests.
- Against other work in Washington, this sits in the middle: 299 of 493 occupations with published pay. Solidly ordinary for the state, which is not the same as ordinary nationally.
- Costs eat into it here. Of $61,570, tax leaves $51,651 — and because Washington is dearer than average, that stretches only as far as $47,578 would nationally. Averages run higher here, $62,130, since top earners drag the number up.
- Washington occupies the middle band for postal service clerks: a median of $61,570, ranking 29 of 51. Where nominal pay is close to the national figure, the tax and price adjustments below carry proportionally more weight in determining the real outcome.
- Postal service clerks ranks 299 of 493 occupations in Washington 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, $51,651 remains from the Washington median of $61,570 for this occupation. Applying the state's above-average price parity yields $47,578 in national-average terms — the quantity relevant to a relocation decision, and the one absent from essentially every published wage comparison. Mean pay of $62,130 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Postal Service Clerks
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $42,600 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $61,570 |
| Top tenth earn over | $75,030 |
| This salary | $61,570 |
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 | $51,651 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $51,651 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$5,575 |
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 | $61,570 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$6,743 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 109 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Treat $61,570 as a midpoint for Washington, not a promise. The tenth percentile is $42,600 and the ninetieth is $75,030 — a wide band, and where you land in it depends on far more than the state.
- That $51,651 take-home in Washington comes from $61,570. 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 299 of 493.
- Two cautions on $47,578, the adjusted value of that $61,570 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Washington. 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 299 of 493 locally.
- The Washington median of $61,570 describes the midpoint of a distribution spanning $42,600 to $75,030. 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 $51,651, from $61,570, assumes a single Washington 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 299 of 493 locally, and the state ranks 29 of 51 for it.
- This $47,578 adjusted figure, worked from $61,570, 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 299 of 493 in the state. The occupation ranks 299 of 493 locally.
Questions people ask
How much does pay for this job actually vary?
The range here is narrow. From $42,600 at the bottom tenth to $75,030 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 $47,578 of national purchasing power.
Is most of this wage taxed away?
No. $51,651 survives, because Washington levies no wage income tax. The federal share does not change with the state you work in.
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.
What is the dispersion of this occupation's wage distribution?
The tenth-to-ninetieth percentile span ($42,600 to $75,030) 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 $47,578 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 $51,651 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.