Title Examiners, Abstractors, and Searchers in Illinois
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$40,017
after federal, FICA and Illinois tax
Tax takes
$9,973
19.9% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$40,481
Illinois costs less than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Illinois — 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
$49,990
Kept after tax
$40,017
Worth in national money
$40,481
State rank
33
of 47 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Pay for this job is on the low side in Illinois. The middle earner gets $49,990. That is 33 of 47 states, and about 14.77% under the national figure. Whether that matters depends on what things cost here.
- Ordinary, locally speaking. This job ranks 319 among 494 occupations Illinois publishes pay for.
- Cost of living is unremarkable here. From $49,990, tax leaves $40,017, and adjusting for local prices barely moves it — about $40,481 in comparable terms. Averages run higher here, $55,480, since top earners drag the number up.
- For title examiners, abstractors, and searchers, Illinois sits in the lower band at $49,990, ranking 33 of 47 and trailing the national median by about 14.77%. Nominal rankings routinely invert once tax and regional price level are applied, so this position should not be read as the conclusion.
- Position 319 of 494 in Illinois places title examiners, abstractors, and searchers in the middle of the state's wage distribution. Because within-state and cross-state rankings measure different things, this figure and the national one above should be read together rather than as a single verdict.
- Because Illinois sits close to the national price level, the real-terms figure for title examiners, abstractors, and searchers — median $49,990 — tracks the post-tax figure closely: $40,017 retained, $40,481 adjusted. ⚠️ Neither is a wage; the second describes what the first buys. Mean pay of $55,480 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Title Examiners, Abstractors, and Searchers
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $38,150 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $49,990 |
| Top tenth earn over | $74,640 |
| This salary | $49,990 |
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 Illinois | $40,017 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $42,347 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$3,097 |
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 | $47,091 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$3,746 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 99 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Half the people doing this work in Illinois earn less than $49,990. The published range is $38,150 up to $74,640, so an individual figure can sit a long way from the middle in either direction.
- That $40,017 take-home in Illinois comes from $49,990. 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 319 of 494.
- Two cautions on $40,481, the adjusted value of that $49,990 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Illinois. 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 319 of 494 locally.
- Reported values are medians; for title examiners, abstractors, and searchers in Illinois the tenth-to-ninetieth percentile band is $38,150 to $74,640. Neither the median nor the band is an offer rate, and neither accounts for hours, shift differentials or overtime.
- Retained pay of $40,017, from $49,990, assumes a single Illinois 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 319 of 494 locally, and the state ranks 33 of 47 for it.
- This $40,481 adjusted figure, worked from $49,990, 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 319 of 494 in the state. The occupation ranks 319 of 494 locally.
Questions people ask
Is this the average pay for the job?
No — it is the middle. Half of these workers earn more and half earn less. The average is $55,480, pulled upward by the top of the range, which is why the middle is the fairer number to plan against.
Why is the pay range for this job so wide?
The label is broader than the work. From $38,150 at the bottom tenth to $74,640 at the top, the same title covers roles that share little beyond a name.
What does this pay actually buy where I live?
More than the figure suggests. Prices in Illinois sit below the national level, so take-home here stretches like $40,481 would elsewhere. The wage is the same; the ground it covers is larger.
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 Illinois adds its own income tax on top — which is why $40,017 of this wage survives to your account.
Why is this job missing from some states?
Because the survey suppresses a figure when too few employers report it. This occupation has published pay in 47 states — the rest are withheld to protect confidentiality, which is not the same as nobody doing the work there.
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 Illinois is $55,480. 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 drives the percentile dispersion in this occupation?
Dispersion between the tenth percentile ($38,150) and the ninetieth ($74,640) exceeds the family median dispersion. SOC codes aggregate roles differing in seniority, industry and specialisation, and BLS does not disaggregate below the detailed occupation level, so within-title variance is not separable from the published series.
What is this occupation's price-adjusted compensation in this state?
Illinois'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 $40,481 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 $40,017 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and Illinois 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.
Why does this occupation lack published estimates in every state?
BLS suppresses estimates failing disclosure or reliability criteria. This occupation has published state-level estimates in 47 of the fifty-one jurisdictions. Suppression reflects sample size and confidentiality rules, and cannot be read as an absence of employment.