Tour and Travel Guides in Alabama
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$26,322
after federal, FICA and Alabama tax
Tax takes
$5,378
17.0% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$29,257
Alabama costs less than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Alabama — 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
$31,700
Kept after tax
$26,322
Worth in national money
$29,257
State rank
44
of 50 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- Pay for tour and travel guides is on the low side in Alabama. The middle earner gets $31,700. That is 44 of 50 states, and about 16.84% under the national figure. Whether that matters depends on what things cost here.
- Against 482 occupations Alabama publishes, tour and travel guides lands at 433. That is the lower quarter. That is the comparison people actually feel, more than any national table.
- Alabama is cheaper than average, and that shows up here. From $31,700 the take-home is $26,322; adjusted for what things actually cost, it goes as far as $29,257 would nationally. The average lands at $31,620, below the middle of the range.
- For tour and travel guides, Alabama sits in the lower band at $31,700, ranking 44 of 50 and trailing the national median by about 16.84%. Nominal rankings routinely invert once tax and regional price level are applied, so this position should not be read as the conclusion.
- Within Alabama, this work ranks 433 of 482 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.
- Post-tax income for tour and travel guides in Alabama, on $31,700, is $26,322 — equivalent to $29,257 once regional price parity is applied. ⚠️ The adjustment uses a statewide index that describes no particular address; within-state price variation, concentrated in housing, routinely exceeds the difference between two states. At $31,620 the mean undershoots the median, an inversion of the usual skew.
Compare this career across states
Choose your filing status and local taxes, compare pay, and keep a shortlist.Compare wage and personal-pay outcomes by state, with selected resident local taxes and saved career choices.
Pay band: Tour and Travel Guides
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $24,110 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $31,700 |
| Top tenth earn over | $41,040 |
| This salary | $31,700 |
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 Alabama | $26,322 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $27,651 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | −$802 |
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 | $30,046 |
|---|---|
| Raise you would need | +$970 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 90 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Treat $31,700 as a midpoint for Alabama, not a promise. The tenth percentile is $24,110 and the ninetieth is $41,040 — a wide band, and where you land in it depends on far more than the state.
- That $26,322 take-home in Alabama comes from $31,700. 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 433 of 482.
- Two cautions on $29,257, the adjusted value of that $31,700 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Alabama. 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 433 of 482 locally.
- The Alabama median of $31,700 describes the midpoint of a distribution spanning $24,110 to $41,040. 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 $26,322, from $31,700, assumes a single Alabama 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 433 of 482 locally, and the state ranks 44 of 50 for it.
- This $29,257 adjusted figure, worked from $31,700, 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 433 of 482 in the state. The occupation ranks 433 of 482 locally.
Questions people ask
How much does pay for this job actually vary?
Most of these jobs pay within a close range — $24,110 at the tenth percentile, $41,040 at the ninetieth.
What does this pay actually buy where I live?
Further than the number implies. Alabama is cheaper than the national average, so this take-home behaves like $29,257 in national terms.
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 Alabama's own levy, $26,322 remains.
Why is this job missing from some states?
A blank is a suppression, not a zero. 50 states have a published figure for this work; the others had too few responses to release one.
What is the dispersion of this occupation's wage distribution?
The tenth-to-ninetieth percentile span ($24,110 to $41,040) sits at or below the family's median dispersion, indicating relatively standardized compensation. Percentiles are published per state, so this dispersion is specific to Alabama rather than a national figure.
What is this occupation's price-adjusted compensation in this state?
Alabama'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 $29,257 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 $26,322 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and Alabama 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 50 of the fifty-one jurisdictions. Suppression reflects sample size and confidentiality rules, and cannot be read as an absence of employment.