Urban and Regional Planners in Alaska
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$74,861
after federal, FICA and Alaska tax
Tax takes
$18,999
20.2% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$73,598
Alaska costs more than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in Alaska — 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
$93,860
Kept after tax
$74,861
Worth in national money
$73,598
State rank
11
of 51 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- This is a good state for the work. Alaska pays urban and regional planners a middle wage of $93,860, ranking 11 of 51 states and sitting about 5.08% above the national middle.
- This is one of the better-paid jobs in Alaska. It ranks 100 out of 430 occupations the state publishes figures for, which puts it in the top quarter locally.
- Cost of living is unremarkable here. From $93,860, tax leaves $74,861, and adjusting for local prices barely moves it — about $73,598 in comparable terms. Here the average runs under the middle, at $90,480.
- Alaska's median for urban and regional planners is $93,860, about 5.08% above the national figure and 11 of 51 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 Alaska, urban and regional planners ranks 100 of 430 occupations by median pay, placing it in the top quartile of the local distribution. This is the comparison a resident actually makes — against neighbors rather than against the same job elsewhere.
- Because Alaska sits close to the national price level, the real-terms figure for urban and regional planners — median $93,860 — tracks the post-tax figure closely: $74,861 retained, $73,598 adjusted. ⚠️ Neither is a wage; the second describes what the first buys. Mean pay of $90,480 sits under the median, so the lower tail is the longer one.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Urban and Regional Planners
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $60,420 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $93,860 |
| Top tenth earn over | $112,930 |
| This salary | $93,860 |
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 Alaska | $74,861 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $74,861 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$3,439 |
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 | $93,860 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$4,750 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 102 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Treat $93,860 as a midpoint for Alaska, not a promise. The tenth percentile is $60,420 and the ninetieth is $112,930 — 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 Alaska's $74,861, worked from $93,860. 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 100 of 430.
- Two cautions on $73,598, the adjusted value of that $93,860 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of Alaska. 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 100 of 430 locally.
- The Alaska median of $93,860 describes the midpoint of a distribution spanning $60,420 to $112,930. 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 Alaska take-home of $74,861, on $93,860 for work ranking 100 of 430 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 100 of 430 in the state.
- This $73,598 adjusted figure, worked from $93,860, 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 100 of 430 in the state. The occupation ranks 100 of 430 locally.
Questions people ask
Is this the average pay for the job?
It is the midpoint, not the average. The average here is $90,480, dragged up by high earners; the middle figure describes a typical worker better.
How much does pay for this job actually vary?
Most of these jobs pay within a close range — $60,420 at the tenth percentile, $112,930 at the ninetieth.
Does a bigger number here mean I am better off?
Not on its own. Prices in Alaska run above the national level, so the same dollars buy less here. Adjusted for that, this pay is worth $73,598 — the wage did not change, only what it covers.
Is most of this wage taxed away?
No. $74,861 survives, because Alaska 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?
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 Alaska is $90,480. 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 is the dispersion of this occupation's wage distribution?
The tenth-to-ninetieth percentile span ($60,420 to $112,930) sits at or below the family's median dispersion, indicating relatively standardized compensation. Percentiles are published per state, so this dispersion is specific to Alaska rather than a national figure.
How does the state price level affect real compensation?
Alaska's regional price parity sits above the national average, so nominal wages overstate purchasing power. Deflating take-home by the state price level gives $73,598 in national-average terms. ⚠️ RPPs are an all-items index; housing parities vary far more widely than the headline figure.
Why is the take-home ratio comparatively high in this state?
Alaska levies no personal income tax on wages, so take-home of $74,861 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.