Cook salary in the United States
The median pay for this job in the United States is $37,390 a year. Half of workers earn between $34,010 and $44,620.
BLS OEWS, May 2025: SOC 35-2014 Cooks, Restaurant, 1,409,890 jobs.
Pay today
| Where in the range | Pay a year |
|---|---|
| 10th percentile | $28,700 |
| 25th percentile | $34,010 |
| Median | $37,390 |
| 75th percentile | $44,620 |
| 90th percentile | $47,900 |
Annual pay across all industries, full and part time, before tax.
Pay at 30, 40 and 50
This is the app's forecast for one example: someone aged 25 with a high school education or less and 7 years of work experience, anywhere in the United States. That is the most common education for the job among US workers (BLS). A different age, education, experience or state changes the numbers.
| Age | Median, with likely range |
|---|---|
| 30 | $35,000 $32,000 to $42,000 |
| 40 | $38,000 $34,000 to $45,000 |
| 50 | $39,000 $35,000 to $46,000 |
On this path pay is highest around age 52, with a median of $39,000.
The range is the 25th to 75th percentile, rounded to the nearest thousand, in today's money. It follows the age curve for people with this education (Census CPS). How it is worked out is on the home page.
Your own numbers. Salary Predictor for iPhone works this out for your age, job, education, experience and state, shows the age your pay tends to peak and where you stand against people your age.
Get Salary Predictor on the App StoreMedian pay by state
| State | Median a year |
|---|---|
| Washington | $47,000 |
| District of Columbia | $46,000 |
| Massachusetts | $46,000 |
| Hawaii | $45,000 |
| Vermont | $45,000 |
| Maine | $45,000 |
| California | $45,000 |
| New York | $44,000 |
| Oregon | $43,000 |
| Colorado | $42,000 |
| New Hampshire | $40,000 |
| Alaska | $40,000 |
| Connecticut | $39,000 |
| Arizona | $39,000 |
| Nevada | $39,000 |
| Minnesota | $39,000 |
| New Jersey | $38,000 |
| Montana | $38,000 |
| Delaware | $38,000 |
| Maryland | $38,000 |
| Illinois | $38,000 |
| Florida | $37,000 |
| Nebraska | $37,000 |
| Michigan | $37,000 |
| Missouri | $37,000 |
| Wyoming | $37,000 |
| Virginia | $37,000 |
| Pennsylvania | $37,000 |
| Wisconsin | $37,000 |
| Rhode Island | $36,000 |
| Utah | $36,000 |
| Idaho | $36,000 |
| North Dakota | $36,000 |
| Tennessee | $36,000 |
| South Dakota | $36,000 |
| Georgia | $36,000 |
| South Carolina | $36,000 |
| Iowa | $36,000 |
| Ohio | $36,000 |
| North Carolina | $35,000 |
| Indiana | $35,000 |
| Kansas | $35,000 |
| New Mexico | $35,000 |
| Texas | $35,000 |
| Kentucky | $35,000 |
| Alabama | $32,000 |
| Oklahoma | $32,000 |
| Arkansas | $30,000 |
| Mississippi | $30,000 |
| West Virginia | $30,000 |
| Louisiana | $29,000 |
BLS OEWS state estimates, May 2025. States where BLS does not publish a median for this job are left out. Rounded to the nearest thousand.
Other service and sales workers in the United States
- Cashier
- Childcare worker
- Firefighter
- Hairdresser / stylist
- Nursing assistant
- Police officer
- Retail salesperson
The same job elsewhere: Canada, United Kingdom.
Sources
- Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics: national estimates. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, May 2025.
- Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics: state estimates. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, May 2025.
- Educational attainment for workers 25 years and older by detailed occupation (Table 5.3). U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employment Projections, 2023-2024.
- PINC-03: Educational attainment by total money earnings, work experience and age. U.S. Census Bureau, Current Population Survey, 2026 ASEC, 2025 earnings.
- Schooling, Experience, and Earnings. Jacob Mincer, National Bureau of Economic Research / Columbia University Press, 1974.
- Earnings Functions, Rates of Return and Treatment Effects: The Mincer Equation and Beyond. Heckman, Lochner & Todd, Handbook of the Economics of Education, vol. 1, 2006.
- The 'Mincer Equation' Thirty Years After Schooling, Experience, and Earnings. Thomas Lemieux, in Jacob Mincer: A Pioneer of Modern Labor Economics (Springer), 2006.
- The Lognormal Distribution, with Special Reference to its Uses in Economics. J. Aitchison & J. A. C. Brown, Cambridge University Press, 1957.
U.S. data are works of the U.S. federal government and in the public domain.