Postal Service Mail Carriers in South Carolina
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$47,032
after federal, FICA and South Carolina tax
Tax takes
$10,668
18.5% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$50,476
South Carolina costs less than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in South Carolina — 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
$57,700
Kept after tax
$47,032
Worth in national money
$50,476
State rank
49
of 51 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- The nominal figure here is modest. South Carolina pays postal service mail carriers a middle wage of $57,700, 49 of 51 states and about 4.71% below the national middle. Hold that thought until the adjusted numbers.
- Against other work in South Carolina, this sits in the middle: 227 of 492 occupations with published pay. Solidly ordinary for the state, which is not the same as ordinary nationally.
- Cheaper living works in this state's favor. From $57,700 you keep $47,032 after tax, and local prices stretch that to the equivalent of $50,476 at national prices. Averages run higher here, $59,480, since top earners drag the number up.
- South Carolina's $57,700 median for postal service mail carriers places it 49 of 51 states, about 4.71% 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.
- Postal service mail carriers ranks 227 of 492 occupations in South Carolina 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.
- Retained pay in South Carolina is $47,032 after the full tax stack, from $57,700. Because the state's price level runs below the national average, the price-adjusted equivalent is $50,476 — a real-terms figure describing purchasing power rather than compensation, and not a number that appears on any pay stub. Mean pay of $59,480 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
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Pay band: Postal Service Mail Carriers
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $42,390 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $57,700 |
| Top tenth earn over | $81,040 |
| This salary | $57,700 |
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 South Carolina | $47,032 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $48,542 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | −$523 |
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 | $55,821 |
|---|---|
| Raise you would need | +$633 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 93 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Treat $57,700 as a midpoint for South Carolina, not a promise. The tenth percentile is $42,390 and the ninetieth is $81,040 — a wide band, and where you land in it depends on far more than the state.
- In South Carolina the take-home figure of $47,032, from $57,700, 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 227 of 492 occupations here.
- Two cautions on $50,476, the adjusted value of that $57,700 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of South Carolina. 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 227 of 492 locally.
- The South Carolina median of $57,700 describes the midpoint of a distribution spanning $42,390 to $81,040. Because that spread is typically larger than the interstate spread, a state median is a weak predictor for any individual worker in this occupation.
- Take-home for South Carolina is computed for a single filer taking the standard deduction with no dependants and no pre-tax contributions, giving $47,032 from $57,700. 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 227 of 492 locally.
- This $50,476 adjusted figure, worked from $57,700, 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 227 of 492 in the state. The occupation ranks 227 of 492 locally.
Questions people ask
Is this the average pay for the job?
It is the midpoint, not the average. The average here is $59,480, dragged up by high earners; the middle figure describes a typical worker better.
How much does pay for this job actually vary?
The range here is narrow. From $42,390 at the bottom tenth to $81,040 at the top, pay for this work clusters rather than spreads.
What does this pay actually buy where I live?
Further than the number implies. South Carolina is cheaper than the national average, so this take-home behaves like $50,476 in national terms.
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 South Carolina adds its own income tax on top — which is why $47,032 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 South Carolina is $59,480. 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 ($42,390 to $81,040) sits at or below the family's median dispersion, indicating relatively standardized compensation. Percentiles are published per state, so this dispersion is specific to South Carolina rather than a national figure.
What is this occupation's price-adjusted compensation in this state?
South Carolina'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 $50,476 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 $47,032 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and South Carolina 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.