What Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers earn in Middlesex County, MA
According to the latest federal wage data for the Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH metropolitan area, the median pay for Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers in Middlesex County, MA is $34,780 a year, or $16.72 an hour. After federal income tax, Social Security, Medicare and state income tax, the paycheck shrinks to $28,555 a year, and rent, food and energy take another bite. The sections below walk through each step with the actual math for Middlesex County, MA.
The mean wage is $38,970, which is 12.0% above the median, a sign that a group of high earners lifts the average. The survey counts about 8,890 people working in this occupation across the Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH metropolitan area, so the estimate rests on a substantial pool of workers. Middlesex County, MA has roughly 1,638,365 residents, according to the population figures used by the rent data.
The salary range, from entry level to top earners
Pay for Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers in the Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH metropolitan area is not one number. The lowest-paid tenth of workers earn up to $31,200 a year ($15.00 an hour), while the highest-paid tenth earn $51,130 or more ($24.58 an hour). That is a gap of $19,930 between the bottom and the top of the scale. The middle half of workers falls between $31,610 at the 25th percentile and $45,610 at the 75th percentile. A top-tier earner makes 1.6 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 Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers in Middlesex County, MA is $16.72. A full-time schedule of 40 hours for 52 weeks adds up to $34,780, and the same salary is $2,898 a month before taxes or about $1,338 per biweekly pay period. After taxes the same job pays $13.73 per hour of take-home income, which is the number that actually has to cover rent and groceries.
About this occupation: Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers
The U.S. Department of Labor's O*NET database describes the work of Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers this way: "Facilitate food service. Clean tables; remove dirty dishes; replace soiled table linens; set tables; replenish supply of clean linens, silverware, glassware, and dishes; supply service bar with food; and serve items such as water, condiments, and coffee to patrons."
Core tasks recorded by O*NET include: "Wipe tables or seats with dampened cloths or replace dirty tablecloths"; "Set tables with clean linens, condiments, or other supplies"; "Scrape and stack dirty dishes and carry dishes and other tableware to kitchens for cleaning"; "Clean up spilled food or drink or broken dishes and remove empty bottles and trash".
Job outlook for Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers
The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects national employment in this occupation to grow from 546,600 jobs in 2025 to 575,500 in 2035, a change of +5.3%, faster than the 3.5% projected for all occupations. The projection counts 95,300 openings a year on average, including positions created by growth and positions left by workers who retire or move to another occupation; that equals 17.4% of current employment each year.
Typical entry-level education: no formal educational credential. Typical on-the-job training to reach competency: short-term on-the-job training. BLS lists a national median annual wage of $33,980 for this occupation; the Middlesex County, MA median of $34,780 is 2.4% above it.
How pay in Middlesex County, MA compares
Compared with the Massachusetts average
Middlesex County, MA pays above the state benchmark. The Massachusetts employment-weighted average for Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers is $34,204; the local median of $34,780 beats it by $576, or 1.7%. Within Massachusetts, Middlesex County, MA already has the highest median we track for this job.
Compared with the national average
The national employment-weighted average for Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers is $31,469 across the contiguous United States. At $34,780, Middlesex County, MA pays $3,311 more, which is 10.5% above 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 Middlesex County, MA
Among the 581 occupations with published wages in Middlesex County, MA, Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers ranks number 578 by median pay, ahead of about 1% of them. The best-paying occupation we track here is Natural Sciences Managers at $291,000 a year, which is $256,220 more than the median for Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers.
From gross pay to take-home pay
A salary of $34,780 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 $6,225 a year, which leaves $28,555, or $2,380 a month.
Put another way, of every $100 earned, about $18 goes to taxes and $82 reaches the paycheck. The overall effective tax rate is 17.9%.
Federal income tax
After the $15,750 standard deduction, taxable income is $19,030. 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 $2,045, an effective 5.9% 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 $2,156 on this salary. Medicare takes 1.45%, or $504. FICA totals $2,661, which is 7.6% of gross pay.
State income tax in Massachusetts
Massachusetts income tax on this salary is $1,519 a year, or 4.4% of gross pay, after the state's own deductions and exemptions are applied. That is 74% of the federal income tax bill, and it comes out to $127 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 Middlesex County, MA
IRS Statistics of Income data for Middlesex County, MA show an average adjusted gross income of $155,231 per return and an average effective federal income tax rate of 18.6% across all filers. Filers in the $25,000 to under $50,000 bracket, where this salary falls, paid an average of 6.0%, compared with the 5.9% 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 Middlesex County, MA
Take-home pay only means something next to what life costs. We price four basics for one adult in Middlesex County, MA: a one-bedroom apartment, food, home energy and gasoline. All of them are converted to annual figures first, then compared with the $28,555 of take-home pay.
Rent
The HUD Fair Market Rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Middlesex County, MA is $2,382 a month, or $28,584 a year. A two-bedroom costs $2,884 a month. For Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers, a one-bedroom absorbs 100.1% of take-home pay and 82.2% 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 9.9% of gross pay for Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers in Middlesex County, MA. It is a thrifty budget with no restaurant meals, so treat it as a floor.
Energy and gasoline
Using Massachusetts residential prices from the Energy Information Administration and national household averages for consumption, electricity costs about $3,101 a year and other home energy such as natural gas about $867, for $3,968 in total. Gasoline in Massachusetts averages $3.33 per gallon; at about 463 gallons a year (11,106 miles at 24 miles per gallon) fuel adds $1,542.
What is left over
The basics cost $37,529 a year in Middlesex County, MA, but take-home pay for Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers is $28,555. That is a shortfall of $8,974 a year, or $748 a month, before health care, transportation beyond fuel, debt or savings. Closing the gap would take roughly 654 extra paid hours a year at the take-home hourly rate of $13.73, or a second earner, a cheaper home or a roommate.
Local housing and commute data for Middlesex County, MA
The budget above covers rent, food, energy and gasoline. Three more local facts shape what a paycheck buys in Middlesex County, MA: 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 Middlesex County, MA, set beside the Massachusetts and national medians.
Property taxes in Middlesex County, MA
Homeowners in Middlesex County, MA pay a median of $7,501 a year in real estate taxes, 25% above the Massachusetts median of $5,992 and 140% above the U.S. median of $3,119. Against a median home value of $727,800, the median tax bill is 1.03% of that value (the ratio of the two county medians). For a worker paid the local Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers median of $34,780, a tax bill of that size would equal 21.6% of gross pay, which matters for anyone planning to buy rather than rent.
Rents, home prices and household income in Middlesex County, MA
Renters in Middlesex County, MA pay a median gross rent of $2,201 a month in the Census survey, 25% above the Massachusetts median of $1,762. HUD's Fair Market Rent for a one-bedroom apartment, which this site uses in the budget, is $2,382 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 $727,800, 29% above the Massachusetts median of $562,100. Median household income is $130,847, 26% above the Massachusetts median of $103,960, so a year of one-bedroom Fair Market Rent equals 21.8% of that income.
Commuting in Middlesex County, MA
Workers in Middlesex County, MA who travel to a workplace spend an average of 29.9 minutes each way, 3% above the Massachusetts average of 29.1. For someone who commutes five days a week, that is 5.0 hours of round-trip travel every week, a cost the budget does not price. 24.7% of workers in Middlesex County, MA work from home, compared with 15.1% nationally, which removes the commute for them.
Can Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers afford to live in Middlesex County, MA?
The 30% rent guideline
A common rule of thumb says rent should stay under 30% of gross income. For a gross salary of $34,780 that ceiling is $870 a month. The one-bedroom Fair Market Rent of $2,382 is $1,513 over it, so rent breaks the guideline. Put as a wage, covering a one-bedroom at the 30% guideline takes $45.81 an hour; the median for Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers is $16.72, which is 63% below that mark. Another way to see it: at $13.73 of take-home pay an hour, a one-bedroom takes about 40.0 working hours every week.
Splitting a two-bedroom
Sharing a two-bedroom at $2,884 a month means $1,442 each. Compared with renting a one-bedroom alone, that saves $11,280 a year. With a roommate, the yearly margin after the basics becomes $2,306, which turns the shortfall into a surplus.
How fast you can save
With no monthly margin after the four basics, saving requires a change on one side of the ledger: higher pay than the $34,780 median, lower housing costs than the $2,382 one-bedroom rent, or a second income.
Frequently asked questions about Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers pay in Middlesex County, MA
What is the hourly wage for Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers in Middlesex County, MA?
The median is $16.72 per hour, based on $34,780 a year over 2,080 hours. Hourly pay runs from about $15.00 at the 10th percentile to $24.58 at the 90th percentile.
What is the take-home pay for Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers in Middlesex County, MA?
After federal income tax, FICA and state income tax, the median salary of $34,780 becomes $28,555 a year. That is $2,380 a month, $1,098 every two weeks or $549 a week.
What percentage of pay goes to taxes for Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers in Middlesex County, MA?
Total taxes are $6,225 a year, an effective rate of 17.9%: $2,045 federal income tax, $2,661 FICA and $1,519 Massachusetts income tax.
Is pay for Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers in Middlesex County, MA above the Massachusetts average?
Yes. The local median of $34,780 is +1.7% versus the Massachusetts average of $34,204, a difference of $576 a year.
Is a one-bedroom rent affordable on the median Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers salary in Middlesex County, MA?
A one-bedroom costs $2,382 a month against take-home pay of $2,380, which is 100.1% of take-home pay. That does not meet the 30%-of-gross guideline, which allows up to $870 a month.
How much is left after rent, food and energy for Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers in Middlesex County, MA?
Nothing remains: the basics cost $37,529 a year, which is $8,974 more than take-home pay, a monthly shortfall of $748.
What hourly wage covers a one-bedroom in Middlesex County, MA at the 30% guideline?
$45.81 an hour for a full-time schedule, calculated as the $28,584 annual rent divided by 0.30 and by 2,080 hours. The median for Dining Room and Cafeteria Attendants and Bartender Helpers is $16.72.
How we calculated these numbers
Wages are May 2025 medians from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics survey for the Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH metropolitan 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 Massachusetts 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.