Study · September 2026
The Take-Home Index 2026
34 jobs, all 50 states and DC. The median wage, what 2026 tax leaves you, and what that is worth at local prices. In 20 of the 34 jobs the highest-paying state is not the best state to work in. A software developer in Washington ends up $9,871 a year better off than one in California, which pays the highest salary in the country. A registered nurse is $1,036 ahead in Washington while earning $16,070 less on paper.
Why we publish research
A calculator answers the question you already knew to ask. Research tells you which question to ask. Both come from the same place: public datasets, applied carefully, with the arithmetic shown. Everything here is built from sources anyone can download, so anyone can check it — and we would rather you did.
Every study we publish comes with its dataset, its method and its limits. If you find a mistake, tell us and we will correct it in public.
Using our work
Our datasets are released under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence: use them, chart them, build on them, commercially or not, as long as you credit Calculator Dad and link back. Journalists and researchers are welcome to request a cut of the data, a state-level breakdown, or a figure checked before publication.