Postal Service Mail Carriers in Tennessee
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$49,241
after federal, FICA and Tennessee tax
Tax takes
$9,329
15.9% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$53,225
Tennessee costs less than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Tennessee — 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
$58,570
Kept after tax
$49,241
Worth in national money
$53,225
State rank
44
of 51 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Pay for postal service mail carriers is on the low side in Tennessee. The middle earner gets $58,570. That is 44 of 51 states, and about 3.27% under the national figure. Whether that matters depends on what things cost here.
- Against other work in Tennessee, this sits in the middle: 222 of 491 occupations with published pay. Solidly ordinary for the state, which is not the same as ordinary nationally.
- Here is where Tennessee does better than its wage suggests. From a median of $58,570 you keep $49,241, and because things cost less here than the national average, that behaves like $53,225 would elsewhere. The average is higher, $60,590, because the best-paid pull it up.
- For postal service mail carriers, Tennessee sits in the lower band at $58,570, ranking 44 of 51 and trailing the national median by about 3.27%. Nominal rankings routinely invert once tax and regional price level are applied, so this position should not be read as the conclusion.
- Postal service mail carriers ranks 222 of 491 occupations in Tennessee 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 federal, FICA and Tennessee income tax, retained pay for postal service mail carriers on $58,570 is $49,241. Deflating by the state's price level — below the national average — gives $53,225 in national-average terms. ⚠️ That figure is purchasing power, not a wage, and nobody is paid it; it is what the take-home buys. The mean of $60,590 sits above the median, the right skew typical of wage data.
Compare this career across states
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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 | $58,570 |
| Top tenth earn over | $81,040 |
| This salary | $58,570 |
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 Tennessee | $49,241 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $49,241 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | −$2,552 |
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 | $58,570 |
|---|---|
| Raise you would need | +$3,087 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 93 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Treat $58,570 as a midpoint for Tennessee, 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.
- That $49,241 take-home in Tennessee comes from $58,570. 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 222 of 491.
- Two cautions on $53,225, the adjusted value of that $58,570 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Tennessee. 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 222 of 491 locally.
- The Tennessee median of $58,570 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.
- Retained pay of $49,241, from $58,570, assumes a single Tennessee 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 222 of 491 locally, and the state ranks 44 of 51 for it.
- This $53,225 adjusted figure, worked from $58,570, 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 222 of 491 in the state. The occupation ranks 222 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 $60,590 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 $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?
More than the figure suggests. Prices in Tennessee sit below the national level, so take-home here stretches like $53,225 would elsewhere. The wage is the same; the ground it covers is larger.
Is most of this wage taxed away?
No. $49,241 survives, because Tennessee 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?
All 51 jurisdictions report this work, which makes the ranking a like-for-like one.
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 Tennessee is $60,590. 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 Tennessee rather than a national figure.
What is this occupation's price-adjusted compensation in this state?
Tennessee'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 $53,225 in national-average terms. The adjustment uses an all-items index and does not isolate housing.
Why is the take-home ratio comparatively high in this state?
Tennessee levies no personal income tax on wages, so take-home of $49,241 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.