Social Worker Salary Calculator

1. Pick the BLS occupation code that matches your job. Then choose annual or hourly and enter your gross pay.
2. Enter your paid hours per week and paid weeks per year. Leave 40 and 52 for a full-time, year-round job.
3. Read the pay conversion and the BLS comparison. Add a second offer to see both against the same table.

The tool does not estimate tax. For a plain pay conversion without the BLS comparison, use the salary calculator.

The social worker salary calculator is a pay converter with a built-in copy of the federal wage tables for social workers. It restates your gross pay per year, month, pay period, week and hour, then ranks it within the occupation code you choose.

Social workers help individuals, groups and families prevent and cope with problems in their everyday lives. They assess client needs, connect people with resources such as childcare and healthcare, respond to crises such as child abuse, and keep case records. Clinical social workers also diagnose and treat mental, behavioral and emotional problems.

BLS does not publish one wage table for the job title. It splits social workers into four detailed occupations, and the calculator holds all four.

• 21-1021 Child, family and school social workers.
• 21-1022 Healthcare social workers.
• 21-1023 Mental health and substance abuse social workers.
• 21-1029 Social workers, all other.

The four codes cover 775,920 employee jobs. Child, family and school social workers make up 51 percent of them, so that code is the default. The tool applies no licence, state or cost-of-living multipliers, because BLS publishes none in these tables.

The calculator converts your pay to one year, then finds its place between two published BLS percentiles. BLS publishes five percentile wages per occupation. The tool draws a straight line between the two nearest ones.

1. Annual pay: an hourly wage is multiplied by your hours and weeks. A salary is used as entered.
2. Hourly pay: annual pay is divided by hours per week times weeks per year.
3. Band: the tool finds the two BLS percentiles on each side of your pay.
4. Approximate percentile: for $52,000 the nearest points are the 25th percentile ($48,270) and the median ($59,550). 25 + (52,000 - 48,270) / (59,550 - 48,270) x 25 = 33.3, shown as about the 33rd.
5. Gap: annual pay minus the BLS median of $59,550.

Pay below the 10th percentile or above the 90th gets no number, because BLS publishes no points beyond them. A wage that BLS shows only as at or above its reporting limit is never replaced with a guess. BLS annual wages equal the hourly wage times 2,080 hours. A part-time schedule lowers annual pay but not the hourly rate, so the tool also places your hourly rate. To convert a salary on other schedules, try the salary to hourly calculator.

A healthcare social worker (21-1022) earns $31.50 an hour for a 40-hour week, 52 weeks a year. A hospital offers $34.00 an hour for the same hours.

1. Hours per year: 40 x 52 = 2,080.
2. Annual pay: 31.50 x 2,080 = $65,520.00.
3. Monthly pay: $5,460.00. Biweekly pay: $2,520.00. Weekly pay: $1,260.00.
4. Annual percentile: $65,520.00 sits between $56,710 and $67,880, at about the 45th percentile.
5. Gap to the median: 65,520 - 67,880 = -$2,360.00, or -3.5%.
6. Second offer: 34 x 2,080 = $70,720.00, which is +$5,200.00 (+7.9%) and about the 55th percentile.

The hourly and annual percentiles match here, because the schedule equals the 2,080 hours BLS assumes. The $2.50 raise moves this worker from below the median to above it. The same $65,520.00 entered under code 21-1021 would rank higher, because that median is $59,550.

Type of Social Work

The median differs by $12,350 between the lowest and highest of the four codes. Picking the right code is the largest choice a user makes in this tool.

Industry

The Occupational Outlook Handbook lists May 2025 median wages for all social workers by industry.

Hospitals pay $25,460 more at the median than individual and family services.

Degree and Licence

A bachelor degree in social work is the common entry requirement for nonclinical jobs. Clinical social workers need a master degree, supervised experience and a state licence. BLS does not publish wages by degree or licence, so the tool shows no premium for either.

Evening, Weekend and On-Call Work

Social workers sometimes work evenings, weekends and holidays and may be on call. BLS wages exclude overtime pay, on-call pay and shift differentials. Leave those out of the pay you enter, and price them with the overtime pay calculator.

Healthcare and all-other social workers have the highest medians, and mental health and substance abuse social workers have the fastest projected growth. Wages are May 2025 BLS figures. Growth is the BLS projection for 2025 to 2035.

The spread inside one code is wider than the spread between codes. For mental health and substance abuse social workers, the 90th percentile is 2.6 times the 10th.

Comparing a Hospital Offer with an Agency Job

Choose 21-1022 for the hospital role. Enter your current pay and the offer. Both are placed on the healthcare table.

Checking a School District Salary Step

Choose 21-1021, enter the salary and set weeks to the paid weeks in the contract. The hourly figure shows the rate for the time worked.

Deciding on a Master Degree

The tables show wage bands, not degree premiums. Students can still test whether pay near the median covers borrowing with the student loan payoff calculator.

1. Using the Wrong Occupation Code

A hospital discharge planner belongs under 21-1022, not 21-1021. The medians differ by $8,330.

2. Quoting One Number for All Social Workers

The $61,780 median blends four occupations. No single type has that median.

3. Expecting a Licence Premium from the Table

BLS does not split these wages by licence. A clinical licence may raise pay, but this table cannot say by how much.

4. Adding On-Call Pay to the Comparison

BLS excludes on-call pay and overtime. Including them makes your pay look higher against the table than it is.

5. Comparing a Nonprofit Wage with the Hospital Median

Individual and family services have a $51,980 median. Hospitals have $77,440. Compare within your own industry where you can.

Social workers typically need a bachelor or master degree in social work. A master program generally takes 2 years and includes a supervised practicum. All states require clinical social workers to be licensed, and some states also license nonclinical social workers.

BLS projects employment of social workers to grow 6 percent from 2025 to 2035, faster than average, with about 69,100 openings a year. Total jobs are projected to rise from 816,100 to 866,500. Mental health and substance abuse social work is projected to grow 10 percent and healthcare social work 8 percent. BLS notes that state and local budgets may limit growth for child, family and school social workers.

The pay conversion is exact arithmetic. The percentile is an estimate, because BLS publishes only five points of the wage distribution for social workers. The result is an estimate from survey data. It is not a pay offer and not a prediction of your pay.

The BLS median annual wage for all social workers was $61,780 in May 2025. The lowest tenth earned less than $42,790 and the highest tenth earned more than $100,090.

Social workers, all other (21-1029) had the highest median at $71,900 in May 2025. Healthcare social workers followed at $67,880.

The BLS median hourly wage for healthcare social workers was $32.63 in May 2025. The 75th percentile was $39.54.

Their BLS median was $59,550 a year, or $28.63 an hour, in May 2025. The middle half earned between $48,270 and $76,070.

BLS does not publish wages by licence or degree, so this page gives no figure. The tables group social workers by the kind of work, not by credential.

Pick the code that describes your clients and setting: 21-1021 for children, families and schools, 21-1022 for healthcare, 21-1023 for mental health and substance abuse. Use 21-1029 when none fits.

Hospitals had the highest median for social workers at $77,440 in May 2025. Individual and family services had the lowest of the listed industries at $51,980.

Yes. BLS projects 6 percent growth from 2025 to 2035 and about 69,100 openings a year. Mental health and substance abuse social work has the fastest projected growth at 10 percent.

No. BLS wages exclude overtime pay, on-call pay and shift differentials, so enter your straight-time pay for a fair comparison.

No. Every amount is gross pay before tax and deductions. The tool does not estimate tax.

• BLS OEWS Profiles, May 2025 (US Bureau of Labor Statistics data tool; select 21-1021, 21-1022, 21-1023 or 21-1029. Read 2026-10-02.)
• Occupational Outlook Handbook: Social Workers (US Bureau of Labor Statistics. Duties, education, pay and 2025 to 2035 outlook. Read 2026-10-02.)
• OEWS frequently asked questions (US Bureau of Labor Statistics. Who is covered, how wages are defined, the 2,080 hour rule and the reporting limit.)
• OEWS data tables, May 2025 release (US Bureau of Labor Statistics. Full national, state and area files.)