What Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers earn in Pratt County, KS
According to the latest federal wage data for the Kansas nonmetropolitan area, the median pay for Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers in Pratt County, KS is $51,070 a year, or $24.55 an hour. After federal income tax, Social Security, Medicare and state income tax, the paycheck shrinks to $41,113 a year, and rent, food and energy take another bite. The sections below walk through each step with the actual math for Pratt County, KS.
The mean wage is $57,630, which is 12.8% above the median, a sign that a group of high earners lifts the average. The survey counts about 8,100 people working in this occupation across the Kansas nonmetropolitan area, so the estimate rests on a substantial pool of workers. Pratt County, KS has roughly 9,127 residents, according to the population figures used by the rent data.
The salary range, from entry level to top earners
Pay for Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers in the Kansas nonmetropolitan area is not one number. The lowest-paid tenth of workers earn up to $40,310 a year ($19.38 an hour), while the highest-paid tenth earn $78,730 or more ($37.85 an hour). That is a gap of $38,420 between the bottom and the top of the scale. The middle half of workers falls between $45,420 at the 25th percentile and $62,880 at the 75th percentile. A top-tier earner makes 2.0 times what someone at the bottom makes, so experience, certification and employer all matter.
What the hourly rate looks like
Converted to an hourly wage, the median for Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers in Pratt County, KS is $24.55. A full-time schedule of 40 hours for 52 weeks adds up to $51,070, and the same salary is $4,256 a month before taxes or about $1,964 per biweekly pay period. After taxes the same job pays $19.77 per hour of take-home income, which is the number that actually has to cover rent and groceries.
About this occupation: Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers
The U.S. Department of Labor's O*NET database describes the work of Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers this way: "Drive a tractor-trailer combination or a truck with a capacity of at least 26,001 pounds Gross Vehicle Weight (GVW). May be required to unload truck. Requires commercial drivers' license. Includes tow truck drivers."
Core tasks recorded by O*NET include: "Check vehicles to ensure that mechanical, safety, and emergency equipment is in good working order"; "Maintain logs of working hours or of vehicle service or repair status, following applicable state and federal regulations"; "Obtain receipts or signatures for delivered goods and collect payment for services when required"; "Maneuver trucks into loading or unloading positions, following signals from loading crew and checking that vehicle and loading equipment are properly positioned".
Job outlook for Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers
The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects national employment in this occupation to grow from 2,221,200 jobs in 2025 to 2,305,000 in 2035, a change of +3.8%, faster than the 3.5% projected for all occupations. The projection counts 214,500 openings a year on average, including positions created by growth and positions left by workers who retire or move to another occupation; that equals 9.7% of current employment each year. About 7.3% of the people in this occupation are self-employed, and wage figures cover wage and salary workers only.
Typical entry-level education: postsecondary nondegree award. Typical on-the-job training to reach competency: short-term on-the-job training. BLS lists a national median annual wage of $58,640 for this occupation; the Pratt County, KS median of $51,070 is 12.9% below it.
How pay in Pratt County, KS compares
Compared with the Kansas average
The local median of $51,070 sits below the Kansas employment-weighted average of $56,475. The shortfall is $5,405 a year, or 9.6%, so Pratt County, KS is a lower-paying market for this job than the state as a whole. Within Kansas, the highest median we track for this job is $60,170 in Johnson County, KS.
Compared with the national average
The national employment-weighted average for Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers is $57,851 across the contiguous United States. At $51,070, Pratt County, KS pays $6,781 less, which is 11.7% below that benchmark. Keep in mind that a higher salary only helps if living costs do not rise faster, which is why the cost sections below matter as much as the headline number.
Where this job ranks in Pratt County, KS
Among the 446 occupations with published wages in Pratt County, KS, Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers ranks number 206 by median pay, ahead of about 54% of them. The best-paying occupation we track here is Registered Nurses at $78,730 a year, which is $27,660 more than the median for Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers.
From gross pay to take-home pay
A salary of $51,070 does not arrive in full. We model a single filer with wage income only, the standard deduction and tax-year 2025 rules, and we keep the three tax layers apart: federal income tax, FICA (Social Security and Medicare) and state income tax. Together they take $9,957 a year, which leaves $41,113, or $3,426 a month.
Put another way, of every $100 earned, about $19 goes to taxes and $81 reaches the paycheck. The overall effective tax rate is 19.5%.
Federal income tax
After the $15,750 standard deduction, taxable income is $35,320. Federal brackets are marginal, so only the slice of income above each threshold is taxed at the higher rate; the last dollars of this salary fall in the 12% bracket. The resulting federal income tax is $4,000, an effective 7.8% of gross pay, well below the 12% marginal rate because the lower brackets are cheaper.
Social Security and Medicare (FICA)
Payroll taxes are a flat percentage of wages. Social Security takes 6.2% up to a wage base of $176,100, which costs $3,166 on this salary. Medicare takes 1.45%, or $741. FICA totals $3,907, which is 7.7% of gross pay.
State income tax in Kansas
Kansas income tax on this salary is $2,050 a year, or 4.0% of gross pay, after the state's own deductions and exemptions are applied. That is 51% of the federal income tax bill, and it comes out to $171 a month. Local taxes such as county or city income taxes are not included, so a few jurisdictions may withhold slightly more.
A cross-check with IRS data for Pratt County, KS
IRS Statistics of Income data for Pratt County, KS show an average adjusted gross income of $73,763 per return and an average effective federal income tax rate of 11.3% across all filers. Filers in the $50,000 to under $75,000 bracket, where this salary falls, paid an average of 6.9%, compared with the 7.8% estimated here for a single filer taking the standard deduction. Gaps between the two reflect filing status, dependents, credits and other income, none of which a single-person wage estimate includes.
Cost of living in Pratt County, KS
Take-home pay only means something next to what life costs. We price four basics for one adult in Pratt County, KS: a one-bedroom apartment, food, home energy and gasoline. All of them are converted to annual figures first, then compared with the $41,113 of take-home pay.
Rent
The HUD Fair Market Rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Pratt County, KS is $805 a month, or $9,660 a year. A two-bedroom costs $961 a month. For Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers, a one-bedroom absorbs 23.5% of take-home pay and 18.9% of gross pay.
Food
The USDA Thrifty Food Plan (August 2026) puts the cost of a nutritious home-cooked diet for an adult at about $3,436 a year, which is $286 a month or $66.07 a week. That equals 6.7% of gross pay for Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers in Pratt County, KS. It is a thrifty budget with no restaurant meals, so treat it as a floor.
Energy and gasoline
Using Kansas residential prices from the Energy Information Administration and national household averages for consumption, electricity costs about $1,495 a year and other home energy such as natural gas about $515, for $2,011 in total. Gasoline in Kansas averages $3.10 per gallon; at about 463 gallons a year (11,106 miles at 24 miles per gallon) fuel adds $1,436.
What is left over
Add the four basics together and living costs come to $16,542 a year, 40% of take-home pay. That leaves $24,571 a year, or $2,048 a month, for savings, transportation beyond fuel, health care, debt and everything else. That margin equals 48.1% of gross pay, a comfortable cushion by common budgeting rules.
Local housing and commute data for Pratt County, KS
The budget above covers rent, food, energy and gasoline. Three more local facts shape what a paycheck buys in Pratt County, KS: property taxes, housing prices and the daily commute. The figures below are exact U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey 2020-2024 5-year estimates for Pratt County, KS, set beside the Kansas and national medians.
Property taxes in Pratt County, KS
Homeowners in Pratt County, KS pay a median of $1,993 a year in real estate taxes, 29% below the Kansas median of $2,798 and 36% below the U.S. median of $3,119. Against a median home value of $114,600, the median tax bill is 1.74% of that value (the ratio of the two county medians). For a worker paid the local Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers median of $51,070, a tax bill of that size would equal 3.9% of gross pay, which matters for anyone planning to buy rather than rent.
Rents, home prices and household income in Pratt County, KS
Renters in Pratt County, KS pay a median gross rent of $802 a month in the Census survey, 24% below the Kansas median of $1,060. HUD's Fair Market Rent for a one-bedroom apartment, which this site uses in the budget, is $805 a month; the two measures differ because the Census figure covers units of every size that renters already occupy, while the HUD figure is a one-bedroom benchmark. The median value of an owner-occupied home is $114,600, 47% below the Kansas median of $217,200. Median household income is $66,022, 11% below the Kansas median of $74,275, so a year of one-bedroom Fair Market Rent equals 14.6% of that income.
Commuting in Pratt County, KS
Workers in Pratt County, KS who travel to a workplace spend an average of 12.2 minutes each way, 38% below the Kansas average of 19.7. For someone who commutes five days a week, that is 2.0 hours of round-trip travel every week, a cost the budget does not price. 6.5% of workers in Pratt County, KS work from home, compared with 15.1% nationally, which removes the commute for them.
Can Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers afford to live in Pratt County, KS?
The 30% rent guideline
A common rule of thumb says rent should stay under 30% of gross income. For a gross salary of $51,070 that ceiling is $1,277 a month. The one-bedroom Fair Market Rent of $805 is $472 under it, so rent fits the guideline. Put as a wage, covering a one-bedroom at the 30% guideline takes $15.48 an hour; the median for Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers is $24.55, which is 59% above that mark. Another way to see it: at $19.77 of take-home pay an hour, a one-bedroom takes about 9.4 working hours every week.
Splitting a two-bedroom
Sharing a two-bedroom at $961 a month means $481 each. Compared with renting a one-bedroom alone, that saves $3,894 a year. With a roommate, the yearly margin after the basics becomes $28,465.
How fast you can save
At $2,048 a month of margin, building a $10,000 emergency fund would take about 5 months. Setting aside half of the margin stretches the same goal to about 10 months. These figures ignore interest, raises and any spending beyond the four basics.
Frequently asked questions about Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers pay in Pratt County, KS
What is the hourly wage for Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers in Pratt County, KS?
The median is $24.55 per hour, based on $51,070 a year over 2,080 hours. Hourly pay runs from about $19.38 at the 10th percentile to $37.85 at the 90th percentile.
What is the take-home pay for Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers in Pratt County, KS?
After federal income tax, FICA and state income tax, the median salary of $51,070 becomes $41,113 a year. That is $3,426 a month, $1,581 every two weeks or $791 a week.
What percentage of pay goes to taxes for Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers in Pratt County, KS?
Total taxes are $9,957 a year, an effective rate of 19.5%: $4,000 federal income tax, $3,907 FICA and $2,050 Kansas income tax.
Is pay for Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers in Pratt County, KS above the Kansas average?
No. The local median of $51,070 is -9.6% versus the Kansas average of $56,475, a difference of $5,405 a year.
Is a one-bedroom rent affordable on the median Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers salary in Pratt County, KS?
A one-bedroom costs $805 a month against take-home pay of $3,426, which is 23.5% of take-home pay. That meets the 30%-of-gross guideline, which allows up to $1,277 a month.
How much is left after rent, food and energy for Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers in Pratt County, KS?
About $2,048 a month ($24,571 a year) remains after a one-bedroom apartment, food, home energy and gasoline, which together cost $16,542 a year.
What hourly wage covers a one-bedroom in Pratt County, KS at the 30% guideline?
$15.48 an hour for a full-time schedule, calculated as the $9,660 annual rent divided by 0.30 and by 2,080 hours. The median for Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers is $24.55.
How we calculated these numbers
Wages are May 2025 medians from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics survey for the Kansas nonmetropolitan area; hourly-only values are annualized at 2,080 hours. Rents are HUD Fair Market Rents, food costs come from the USDA Thrifty Food Plan, and energy prices come from the Energy Information Administration. County-level tax statistics come from the IRS Statistics of Income.
Taxes use tax-year 2025 federal brackets, FICA rates and the Kansas rules for a single filer with wage income only. Figures are estimates for planning and comparison, not tax or financial advice, and they exclude local income taxes, benefits, retirement contributions and individual circumstances.