Water and Wastewater Treatment Plant and System Operators in California
May 2025 wages · tax year 2026
You keep
$62,843
after federal, FICA and California tax
Tax takes
$18,927
23.1% of the whole
Worth, in national money
$55,820
California costs more than average
On that salary you would be around the 25th percentile for this work in California — 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
$81,770
Kept after tax
$62,843
Worth in national money
$55,820
State rank
1
of 50 states
What this pays, and what it is worth
- This is a good state for the work. California pays this job a middle wage of $81,770, ranking 1 of 50 states and sitting about 36.24% above the national middle.
- Against other work in California, this sits in the middle: 183 of 492 occupations with published pay. Solidly ordinary for the state, which is not the same as ordinary nationally.
- Costs eat into it here. Of $81,770, tax leaves $62,843 — and because California is dearer than average, that stretches only as far as $55,820 would nationally. Averages run higher here, $87,190, since top earners drag the number up.
- California's median for water and wastewater treatment plant and system operators is $81,770, about 36.24% above the national figure and 1 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.
- Water and wastewater treatment plant and system operators ranks 183 of 492 occupations in California by median pay, in the middle bands. Within-state and national positions are separate measurements and a job commonly sits in different quartiles on each.
- After tax, $62,843 remains from the California median of $81,770 for this occupation. Applying the state's above-average price parity yields $55,820 in national-average terms — the quantity relevant to a relocation decision, and the one absent from essentially every published wage comparison. Mean pay of $87,190 exceeds the median, so the upper tail is doing the work.
Compare this career across states
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Pay band: Water and Wastewater Treatment Plant and System Operators
The state median for this job
| Lowest tenth earn under | $56,030 |
|---|---|
| Half earn under | $81,770 |
| Top tenth earn over | $123,380 |
| This salary | $81,770 |
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 California | $62,843 |
|---|---|
| Take-home in Texas | $66,355 |
| Once local prices are leveledBEA price parity | +$12,464 |
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 | $76,777 |
|---|---|
| You could take a cut of | −$16,975 |
| Prices in Texas | 97 vs 113 |
State taxes and state price levels only. No city tax, and no housing market.
Sources and assumptions
- Treat $81,770 as a midpoint for California, not a promise. The tenth percentile is $56,030 and the ninetieth is $123,380 — a wide band, and where you land in it depends on far more than the state.
- In California the take-home figure of $62,843, from $81,770, assumes one filer, no dependants, and nothing paid into a pension before tax. Each of those lowers the bill, so treat it as the plain case. City and school-district income taxes are not included either, and in a few states those are real money. It ranks 183 of 492 occupations here.
- Two cautions on $55,820, the adjusted value of that $81,770 median. It levels out prices with a single number for all of California. 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 183 of 492 locally.
- The California median of $81,770 describes the midpoint of a distribution spanning $56,030 to $123,380. Because that spread is typically larger than the interstate spread, a state median is a weak predictor for any individual worker in this occupation.
- Take-home for California is computed for a single filer taking the standard deduction with no dependants and no pre-tax contributions, giving $62,843 from $81,770. Each omitted item reduces taxable income, so the figure is a lower bound on retained pay for this household shape. Municipal and school-district income taxes are excluded, which understates the burden materially in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Maryland. The occupation ranks 183 of 492 locally.
- This $55,820 adjusted figure, worked from $81,770, 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 183 of 492 in the state. The occupation ranks 183 of 492 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 $87,190, 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?
One title, many jobs. The lowest tenth take $56,030, the highest tenth $123,380, and what separates them is experience, employer and what exactly the role does.
Does a bigger number here mean I am better off?
The number and the value are different things. California costs more than the national average, so this take-home stretches like $55,820 rather than its face figure.
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 California's own levy, $62,843 remains.
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 50 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 California is $87,190. 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 ($56,030) and the ninetieth ($123,380) 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.
How does the state price level affect real compensation?
California's regional price parity sits above the national average, so nominal wages overstate purchasing power. Deflating take-home by the state price level gives $55,820 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 $62,843 reflects federal income tax, OASDI, Medicare and California 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.