We present 2016 United States data in an income percentile by age calculator for every age from 18-80. Our data comes from the Annual Social and Economic Supplement (ASEC) survey from the Current Population Survey, just like our last calculator for 2016 overall income percentiles.
This data uses the same methodology: it includes all incomes listed here. This ASEC was from March 2016, so for comparison purposes you should use full year 2015 incomes when you compare.
For archived years click here: 2013 • 2014 • 2015. We also have (2013) net worth by age.
Source and Methodology on the Income Percentile by Age Calculator
IPUMS-CPS from the University of Minnesota’s Population Center collates the data you see in the tool. Our methodology is covered in this year’s income percentile calculator.
Full credit:
Miriam King, Steven Ruggles, J. Trent Alexander, Sarah Flood, Katie Genadek, Matthew B. Schroeder, Brandon Trampe, and Rebecca Vick. Integrated Public Use Microdata Series, Current Population Survey: Version 3.0. [Machine-readable database]. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota, 2010.
Why Do You Present Income Brackets By Age?
One of our goals here at DQYDJ is to cut through the noise in order to present more relevant statistics than you’ll get elsewhere. Averaging (or taking the median) of 320,000,000 people in the United States isn’t high quality, specific data. We fix it by first dicing the population into only workers, then splitting further by age.
Age is, unarguably, a better comparison for incomes than the generic large bucket you’re often presented. As a contrived example – would you expect the highest recent college graduate earners to touch the highest 48 year old earners? Of course not – and with the data sliced in this way you don’t need to.
Age is also a very good proxy for experience – a 48 year old will, almost without exception, have more experience than a 24 year old. Quoting the median income of an American earner, likewise, doesn’t mean much unless you are that theoretical ‘median’ American. With data split in this way, you can compare yourself to your closest demographic – other people your age!
So, if you’re a 24 year old recent college grad… stop using the generic rolled up statistics. Now you can place yourself with your own peer group in the closest way possible: comparing to other 24 year olds. (Also, thanks for being a reader at a relatively young age!).
It’s harder to compare this data to past years’ data – so let us know what trends you see in the comments!
Several of the links in the text, “For archived years click here: 2015 • 2014 • 2013. We also have (2013) net worth by age.” have broken links.
Otherwise great, thanks for the ego boost.
Whoops – sorry for the bad quality control. Should be fixed now, thanks!
Is this per individual, household, or a mixture of both?
This data is only individual incomes of people who reported working at least one hour per week, working last year, or expressed a desire to work in the CPS. I have a household income calculator incoming – watch for it soon.
Ok, so it says at 67 making $96k a year that is the 76%. Of what, I don’t get it.
Roughly, of those reporting working in the last year or those who wanted to work but did not.
Roughly, of those who reported working in the last year or those who wanted to work but did not; at age 67 or the entire age spectrum, 18-80?
For each individual age, yes. If you go to the generic income calculator linked at the top it’d be the entire population.
Of course, the older in the spectrum the less accurate/harder to divide the cohorts get… retirement and investment income do add a variable to the older crowd.
However, people reporting full retirement with “0 hours worked, no job” would not show up in this tool. You may be more interested in the Net Worth by Age Calculator for comparing those ages.
If people that want to work, but did not work are included in the data set, would that skew the salary percentiles lower? In my opinion, it would be much more accurate and relevant to include only people who work more than 20 ( or some set number) so that you can get a more accurate depiction of how your salary compares to others by age.
For instance, I fall on the younger end of the spectrum where I am sure many students skew the data. I don’t believe this methodology would depict an accurate picture of how I fare compared to other college graduates.
Yes, quite – we do have plans to do something akin to a “Full time” and “Full time, some college education” calculator at a later date to align with our readership a bit better (perhaps not surprisingly, not a lot of college students read DQYDJ, for example). To include the whole workforce, however, this is (as best I can tell) the fairest method, an improvement even on how we’ve defined it in past years.
Keep an eye out for the FT calculators; I’ll see what I can put together.
I also fall on the younger end of this data set and I can’t but help think that these numbers are incredibly low. I’d love to see differentiation between education level (PHD, BA, etc) and gender. In any case, thanks for sharing. Love the interactive chart.
The problem is you’ll quickly lose accuracy if you don’t lighten up on the ages included in your set – if you divide by year then age then gender then educational status you might only have a few data points left. For one off runs, you should be able to do it however – look at Berkeley’s online tool: https://cps.ipums.org/cps/sda.shtml . You might have to back off on a few criteria, but it’ll get you close to what you need.
Is there any way to look at data for incomes of earners 17 years of age? I am unable to find that data anywhere.
Yes, this data includes information on 16 and 17 year olds. As suggested in another comment, try using Berkeley’s online tool to get what you need on teenage earnings: https://cps.ipums.org/cps/sda.shtml
Should we consider employer 401k contributions as income for this calculator?
The data isn’t clear, but when I do my own I include them. Best to have an optimistic view on your income – same would apply for any other tax free account contributions to cafeteria plans/HSAs/FSAs, etc.
Thanks! If you’re in the 90’s percentile (auto correct…I gave up) and in your 30’s, would one be considered elite? Have lots of friends and colleagues make much more than me but they have so much more debt. So second question, is there a calc for income by age vs. current debt/liabilities assuming people / the data understands what a true liability is?
Yes, we have a net worth calculator with age groups: https://dqydj.com/net-worth-by-age-calculator-for-the-united-states/ . I’m not sure what you mean by ‘true’ liabilities – net worth adds up all assets and subtracts all debts.
The only major thing missing from the calculator is deriving a ‘cash value’ for periodic payments for things like insurance, lawsuits, pensions, and social security. They have some theoretical cash value accretive to net worth, but aren’t currently modeled.
Is there any way to only compare income of people working full time, or is the data not that specific? Is there any data available for hourly income as opposed to annual income?
We have a couple:
https://dqydj.com/fulltime-worker-income-calculator-by-percentile/
https://dqydj.com/fulltime-college-educated-income-calculator-percentile-united-states-2016/
Those two might fit the bill.
Yes, I like those too, but they don’t include age as well.
Is 97% for my age a good thing, it is kind of unclear to me. Or does that mean 97% of people my age make the same as me?
97% would mean: “the top 3% of incomes in your age group”. That is, if you have a 99% income you are in the top 1% of all incomes for your age.