Tour and Travel Guides in Colorado
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$35,425
after federal, FICA and Colorado tax
Tax takes
$7,415
17.3% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$34,942
Colorado costs more than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Colorado — 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
$42,840
Kept after tax
$35,425
Worth in national money
$34,942
State rank
11
of 50 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- This is a good state for the work. Colorado pays tour and travel guides a middle wage of $42,840, ranking 11 of 50 states and sitting about 12.38% above the national middle.
- Against 491 occupations Colorado publishes, tour and travel guides lands at 442. That is the lower quarter. That is the comparison people actually feel, more than any national table.
- Cost of living is unremarkable here. From $42,840, tax leaves $35,425, and adjusting for local prices barely moves it — about $34,942 in comparable terms. Averages run higher here, $43,520, since top earners drag the number up.
- Colorado's median for tour and travel guides is $42,840, about 12.38% above the national figure and 11 of 50 states reporting. Whether that premium reaches the worker depends on the two adjustments below, which is the part a wage table cannot tell you.
- Within Colorado, this work ranks 442 of 491 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 Colorado sits close to the national price level, the real-terms figure for tour and travel guides — median $42,840 — tracks the post-tax figure closely: $35,425 retained, $34,942 adjusted. ⚠️ Neither is a wage; the second describes what the first buys. Mean pay of $43,520 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Tour and Travel Guides
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $31,380 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $42,840 |
| Top tenth earn over | $55,600 |
| This salary | $42,840 |
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 Colorado | $35,425 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $36,602 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$2,724 |
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 | $41,376 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$3,294 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 101 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Treat $42,840 as a midpoint for Colorado, not a promise. The tenth percentile is $31,380 and the ninetieth is $55,600 — 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 Colorado's $35,425, worked from $42,840. 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 442 of 491.
- Two cautions on $34,942, the adjusted value of that $42,840 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Colorado. 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 442 of 491 locally.
- The Colorado median of $42,840 describes the midpoint of a distribution spanning $31,380 to $55,600. 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 Colorado take-home of $35,425, on $42,840 for work ranking 442 of 491 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 442 of 491 in the state.
- This $34,942 adjusted figure, worked from $42,840, 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 442 of 491 in the state. The occupation ranks 442 of 491 locally.
Questions people ask
How much does pay for this job actually vary?
The range here is narrow. From $31,380 at the bottom tenth to $55,600 at the top, pay for this work clusters rather than spreads.
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 $34,942 of national purchasing power.
Where does the difference between the wage and my paycheck go?
Four deductions, stacked. The federal layer and the two payroll taxes apply wherever you work; Colorado then takes its own share, leaving $35,425.
Why is this job missing from some states?
The survey withholds small samples rather than publish an unreliable number. Pay appears for 50 states here, and a missing state means too few reports, not no jobs.
What is the dispersion of this occupation's wage distribution?
The tenth-to-ninetieth percentile span ($31,380 to $55,600) sits at or below the family's median dispersion, indicating relatively standardized compensation. Percentiles are published per state, so this dispersion is specific to Colorado rather than a national figure.
How does the state price level affect real compensation?
Colorado's regional price parity sits above the national average, so nominal wages overstate purchasing power. Deflating take-home by the state price level gives $34,942 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 $35,425 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and Colorado 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.