Social and Human Service Assistants in Virginia
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$35,354
after federal, FICA and Virginia tax
Tax takes
$8,096
18.6% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$35,091
Virginia costs more than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Virginia — 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
$43,450
Kept after tax
$35,354
Worth in national money
$35,091
State rank
27
of 51 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Middling, nationally. Virginia pays this job around $43,450 at the midpoint, 27 of 51 states. The interesting numbers on this page are the two below it.
- Against 489 occupations Virginia publishes, this job lands at 396. That is the lower quarter. That is the comparison people actually feel, more than any national table.
- Cost of living is unremarkable here. From $43,450, tax leaves $35,354, and adjusting for local prices barely moves it — about $35,091 in comparable terms. Averages run higher here, $45,060, since top earners drag the number up.
- For social and human service assistants the Virginia median is $43,450, ranking 27 of 51 states reporting. Mid-band nominal positions are the ones most frequently reordered by the adjustments, because no large wage premium exists to absorb a state's tax or price level.
- Within Virginia, this work ranks 396 of 489 occupations by median pay, in the bottom quartile. The within-state position is the more salient one for anyone weighing this job against alternatives available to them locally.
- Because Virginia sits close to the national price level, the real-terms figure for social and human service assistants — median $43,450 — tracks the post-tax figure closely: $35,354 retained, $35,091 adjusted. ⚠️ Neither is a wage; the second describes what the first buys. Mean pay of $45,060 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Social and Human Service Assistants
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $32,840 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $43,450 |
| Top tenth earn over | $60,500 |
| This salary | $43,450 |
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 Virginia | $35,354 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $37,092 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$3,079 |
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 | $41,287 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$3,724 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 101 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Treat $43,450 as a midpoint for Virginia, not a promise. The tenth percentile is $32,840 and the ninetieth is $60,500 — a wide band, and where you land in it depends on far more than the state.
- One filer, no dependants, no pension contributions — that is the household behind Virginia's $35,354, worked from $43,450. That is on purpose. It lets states be compared with each other, not with each other's family circumstances. Local city taxes are left out. Locally this work ranks 396 of 489.
- Two cautions on $35,091, the adjusted value of that $43,450 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Virginia. 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 396 of 489 locally.
- The Virginia median of $43,450 describes the midpoint of a distribution spanning $32,840 to $60,500. Because that spread is typically larger than the interstate spread, a state median is a weak predictor for any individual worker in this occupation.
- The Virginia take-home of $35,354, on $43,450 for work ranking 396 of 489 locally, models the simplest household deliberately: holding it constant is what makes the interstate comparison meaningful. It also means the absolute figure overstates liability for most real filers, and municipal income taxes are outside the model entirely. The occupation ranks 396 of 489 in the state.
- This $35,091 adjusted figure, worked from $43,450, 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 396 of 489 in the state. The occupation ranks 396 of 489 locally.
Questions people ask
Is this the average pay for the job?
It is the midpoint, not the average. The average here is $45,060, dragged up by high earners; the middle figure describes a typical worker better.
How much does pay for this job actually vary?
Less than you might expect. The bottom tenth earn $32,840 and the top tenth $60,500, so most people doing this work in Virginia sit within a fairly tight band.
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 $35,091 of national purchasing power.
Where does the difference between the wage and my paycheck go?
Three of them are federal and one is not. After income tax, Social Security, Medicare and Virginia's own levy, $35,354 remains.
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 Virginia is $45,060. 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 ($32,840 to $60,500) sits at or below the family's median dispersion, indicating relatively standardized compensation. Percentiles are published per state, so this dispersion is specific to Virginia rather than a national figure.
How does the state price level affect real compensation?
Virginia's regional price parity sits above the national average, so nominal wages overstate purchasing power. Deflating take-home by the state price level gives $35,091 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 $35,354 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and Virginia 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.