2026 Edition · An annual reference on what work pays

Elementary School Teachers, Except Special Education

Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV metropolitan area. Estimated employment 30,940.

Data released May 2025 BLS OEWS · SOC 25-2021
Fig. 1 — The wage rule

Where you sit in the distribution

Drag the marker, or type a figure
$79,470 · 50th
$60,79010th
$64,14025th
$79,47050th
$102,75075th
$122,58090th

That is the medianhalf of people in this occupation in Washington earn more.

Table 1 — Adjusted

$79,470 in Washington buys what $73,000 buys across the country as a whole.

Washington's regional price parity is 108.9 — well above the national average — a dollar here buys noticeably less than in the US as a whole. Adjusted figures for other metros are in the nearby-metros table below.

Fig. 2 — Five-year trend

Nominal against real

The same median, once as published and once restated in 2025 dollars.

70k80k90k100k 20212022202320242025
Nominal, as published Real, in 2025 dollars US$ thousands

Published pay fell 2.8% over the five years to 2025. Adjusted for inflation it fell 18.2% — prices rose faster than pay since 2021. The two lines meet at the right edge by construction, since 2025 is the base year.

Sources

How this page was made

Wage data
Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025 release. Public domain.
Price parity
Bureau of Economic Analysis, Regional Price Parities, 2024.
Inflation
Real figures deflate by CPI-U annual averages (BLS, all items, US city average).
Employment
30,940 employed in this occupation in the metro (BLS estimate; excludes the self-employed).
Occupation
SOC 25-2021, Elementary School Teachers, Except Special Education. Mapped to our taxonomy as elementary-school-teachers-except-special-education.

Percentiles are reported exactly as released and are never interpolated between published values. We take no payment from employers, recruiters or anyone else for how any figure is presented.