What Registered Nurses earn in Blount County, TN
If you are weighing a move or a job offer, start with $77,240: the median annual pay for Registered Nurses in Blount County, TN. Spread over a standard 2,080-hour work year, that is $37.13 an hour. Because the wage survey covers the whole Knoxville, TN metropolitan area, the number reflects employers across the region rather than a single town or a single company.
The mean wage is $78,410, which is 1.5% above the median, so pay is spread fairly evenly. The survey counts about 9,500 people working in this occupation across the Knoxville, TN metropolitan area, so the estimate rests on a substantial pool of workers. Blount County, TN has roughly 139,333 residents, according to the population figures used by the rent data.
The salary range, from entry level to top earners
Pay for Registered Nurses in the Knoxville, TN metropolitan area is not one number. The lowest-paid tenth of workers earn up to $57,070 a year ($27.44 an hour), while the highest-paid tenth earn $97,360 or more ($46.81 an hour). That is a gap of $40,290 between the bottom and the top of the scale. The middle half of workers falls between $71,550 at the 25th percentile and $83,000 at the 75th percentile. A top-tier earner makes 1.7 times what someone at the bottom makes, so experience, certification and employer all matter.
What the hourly rate looks like
Employers quote this occupation by the hour or by the year, so here are both: $37.13 an hour or $77,240 a year at the median for Blount County, TN. Before any deductions, that is $6,437 a month, $2,971 every two weeks and $1,485 each week. After taxes the same job pays $30.24 per hour of take-home income, which is the number that actually has to cover rent and groceries.
About this occupation: Registered Nurses
The U.S. Department of Labor's O*NET database describes the work of Registered Nurses this way: "Assess patient health problems and needs, develop and implement nursing care plans, and maintain medical records. Administer nursing care to ill, injured, convalescent, or disabled patients. May advise patients on health maintenance and disease prevention or provide case management. Licensing or registration required."
Core tasks recorded by O*NET include: "Maintain accurate, detailed reports and records"; "Monitor, record, and report symptoms or changes in patients' conditions"; "Record patients' medical information and vital signs"; "Modify patient treatment plans as indicated by patients' responses and conditions".
Job outlook for Registered Nurses
The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects national employment in this occupation to grow from 3,465,400 jobs in 2025 to 3,660,100 in 2035, a change of +5.6%, faster than the 3.5% projected for all occupations. The projection counts 180,800 openings a year on average, including positions created by growth and positions left by workers who retire or move to another occupation; that equals 5.2% of current employment each year.
Typical entry-level education: bachelor's degree. BLS lists a national median annual wage of $97,550 for this occupation; the Blount County, TN median of $77,240 is 20.8% below it.
How pay in Blount County, TN compares
Compared with the Tennessee average
Pay in Blount County, TN runs $3,238 below the Tennessee average of $80,478, a gap of 4.0%. A worker who moved to a better-paying part of Tennessee would, on paper, gain that difference before taxes. Within Tennessee, the highest median we track for this job is $84,040 in Davidson County, TN.
Compared with the national average
The national employment-weighted average for Registered Nurses is $99,368 across the contiguous United States. At $77,240, Blount County, TN pays $22,128 less, which is 22.3% 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 Blount County, TN
Among the 471 occupations with published wages in Blount County, TN, Registered Nurses ranks number 109 by median pay, ahead of about 77% of them. The best-paying occupation we track here is General and Operations Managers at $104,590 a year, which is $27,350 more than the median for Registered Nurses.
From gross pay to take-home pay
Three separate tax bills sit between the gross salary and the bank account: federal income tax, FICA, and state income tax. For Registered Nurses earning the Blount County, TN median of $77,240, they add up to $14,351. The result is $62,889 of take-home pay a year ($5,241 a month), based on a single filer using the standard deduction.
Put another way, of every $100 earned, about $19 goes to taxes and $81 reaches the paycheck. The overall effective tax rate is 18.6%.
Federal income tax
After the $15,750 standard deduction, taxable income is $61,490. 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 22% bracket. The resulting federal income tax is $8,442, an effective 10.9% of gross pay, well below the 22% 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 $4,789 on this salary. Medicare takes 1.45%, or $1,120. FICA totals $5,909, which is 7.6% of gross pay.
State income tax in Tennessee
Tennessee does not tax wage income, so the state income tax line for Registered Nurses in Blount County, TN is $0. That alone leaves more in the paycheck than the same salary would in a state with an income tax. For scale, a hypothetical flat 5% state tax on this salary would cost about $3,862 a year, so the absence of a state tax is worth roughly $322 a month.
A cross-check with IRS data for Blount County, TN
IRS Statistics of Income data for Blount County, TN show an average adjusted gross income of $83,664 per return and an average effective federal income tax rate of 12.7% across all filers. Filers in the $75,000 to under $100,000 bracket, where this salary falls, paid an average of 8.3%, compared with the 10.9% 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 Blount County, TN
Take-home pay only means something next to what life costs. We price four basics for one adult in Blount County, TN: a one-bedroom apartment, food, home energy and gasoline. All of them are converted to annual figures first, then compared with the $62,889 of take-home pay.
Rent
Housing is the largest line in most budgets. For Blount County, TN, HUD sets the Fair Market Rent for a one-bedroom unit at $1,178 a month ($14,136 a year), and at $1,475 for two bedrooms. For Registered Nurses, a one-bedroom absorbs 22.5% of take-home pay and 18.3% 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 4.4% of gross pay for Registered Nurses in Blount County, TN. It is a thrifty budget with no restaurant meals, so treat it as a floor.
Energy and gasoline
Using Tennessee residential prices from the Energy Information Administration and national household averages for consumption, electricity costs about $1,313 a year and other home energy such as natural gas about $421, for $1,733 in total. Gasoline in Tennessee averages $3.08 per gallon; at about 463 gallons a year (11,106 miles at 24 miles per gallon) fuel adds $1,426.
What is left over
Rent, food, energy and gasoline cost $20,731 a year in Blount County, TN. Subtract that from $62,889 of take-home pay and $42,158 remains, which is $3,513 a month of breathing room. That margin equals 54.6% of gross pay, a comfortable cushion by common budgeting rules.
Local housing and commute data for Blount County, TN
The budget above covers rent, food, energy and gasoline. Three more local facts shape what a paycheck buys in Blount County, TN: 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 Blount County, TN, set beside the Tennessee and national medians.
Property taxes in Blount County, TN
Homeowners in Blount County, TN pay a median of $1,453 a year in real estate taxes, in line with the Tennessee median of $1,442 and 53% below the U.S. median of $3,119. Against a median home value of $320,500, the median tax bill is 0.45% of that value (the ratio of the two county medians). For a worker paid the local Registered Nurses median of $77,240, a tax bill of that size would equal 1.9% of gross pay, which matters for anyone planning to buy rather than rent.
Rents, home prices and household income in Blount County, TN
Renters in Blount County, TN pay a median gross rent of $1,090 a month in the Census survey, 8% below the Tennessee median of $1,189. HUD's Fair Market Rent for a one-bedroom apartment, which this site uses in the budget, is $1,178 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 $320,500, 12% above the Tennessee median of $286,700. Median household income is $77,365, 11% above the Tennessee median of $69,595, so a year of one-bedroom Fair Market Rent equals 18.3% of that income.
Commuting in Blount County, TN
Workers in Blount County, TN who travel to a workplace spend an average of 25.3 minutes each way, 2% below the Tennessee average of 25.7. For someone who commutes five days a week, that is 4.2 hours of round-trip travel every week, a cost the budget does not price. 12.3% of workers in Blount County, TN work from home, compared with 15.1% nationally, which removes the commute for them.
Can Registered Nurses afford to live in Blount County, TN?
The 30% rent guideline
A common rule of thumb says rent should stay under 30% of gross income. For a gross salary of $77,240 that ceiling is $1,931 a month. The one-bedroom Fair Market Rent of $1,178 is $753 under it, so rent fits the guideline. Put as a wage, covering a one-bedroom at the 30% guideline takes $22.65 an hour; the median for Registered Nurses is $37.13, which is 64% above that mark. Another way to see it: at $30.24 of take-home pay an hour, a one-bedroom takes about 9.0 working hours every week.
Splitting a two-bedroom
Sharing a two-bedroom at $1,475 a month means $738 each. Compared with renting a one-bedroom alone, that saves $5,286 a year. With a roommate, the yearly margin after the basics becomes $47,444.
How fast you can save
At $3,513 a month of margin, building a $10,000 emergency fund would take about 3 months. Setting aside half of the margin stretches the same goal to about 6 months. These figures ignore interest, raises and any spending beyond the four basics.
Frequently asked questions about Registered Nurses pay in Blount County, TN
How much do Registered Nurses make per hour in Blount County, TN?
The median is $37.13 per hour, based on $77,240 a year over 2,080 hours. Hourly pay runs from about $27.44 at the 10th percentile to $46.81 at the 90th percentile.
How much do Registered Nurses take home after taxes in Blount County, TN?
After federal income tax, FICA, the median salary of $77,240 becomes $62,889 a year. That is $5,241 a month, $2,419 every two weeks or $1,209 a week.
How much tax do Registered Nurses pay in Blount County, TN?
Total taxes are $14,351 a year, an effective rate of 18.6%: $8,442 federal income tax, $5,909 FICA and no Tennessee income tax.
Do Registered Nurses earn more in Blount County, TN than elsewhere in Tennessee?
No. The local median of $77,240 is -4.0% versus the Tennessee average of $80,478, a difference of $3,238 a year.
Can Registered Nurses afford a one-bedroom apartment in Blount County, TN?
A one-bedroom costs $1,178 a month against take-home pay of $5,241, which is 22.5% of take-home pay. That meets the 30%-of-gross guideline, which allows up to $1,931 a month.
What is the monthly budget margin for Registered Nurses in Blount County, TN?
About $3,513 a month ($42,158 a year) remains after a one-bedroom apartment, food, home energy and gasoline, which together cost $20,731 a year.
What hourly wage covers a one-bedroom in Blount County, TN at the 30% guideline?
$22.65 an hour for a full-time schedule, calculated as the $14,136 annual rent divided by 0.30 and by 2,080 hours. The median for Registered Nurses is $37.13.
How we calculated these numbers
Wages are May 2025 medians from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics survey for the Knoxville, TN 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 Tennessee 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.