What Respiratory Therapists earn in Bronx County, NY
According to the latest federal wage data for the New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ metropolitan area, the median pay for Respiratory Therapists in Bronx County, NY is $110,490 a year, or $53.12 an hour. After federal income tax, Social Security, Medicare and state income tax, the paycheck shrinks to $80,700 a year, and rent, food and energy take another bite. The sections below walk through each step with the actual math for Bronx County, NY.
The mean wage is $113,400, which is 2.6% above the median, so pay is spread fairly evenly. The survey counts about 7,010 people working in this occupation across the New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ metropolitan area, so the estimate rests on a substantial pool of workers. Bronx County, NY has roughly 1,404,779 residents, according to the population figures used by the rent data.
The salary range, from entry level to top earners
Pay for Respiratory Therapists in the New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ metropolitan area is not one number. The lowest-paid tenth of workers earn up to $87,090 a year ($41.87 an hour), while the highest-paid tenth earn $131,500 or more ($63.22 an hour). That is a gap of $44,410 between the bottom and the top of the scale. The middle half of workers falls between $100,810 at the 25th percentile and $127,070 at the 75th percentile. A top-tier earner makes 1.5 times what someone at the bottom makes, so experience, certification and employer all matter.
What the hourly rate looks like
Converted to an hourly wage, the median for Respiratory Therapists in Bronx County, NY is $53.12. A full-time schedule of 40 hours for 52 weeks adds up to $110,490, and the same salary is $9,208 a month before taxes or about $4,250 per biweekly pay period. After taxes the same job pays $38.80 per hour of take-home income, which is the number that actually has to cover rent and groceries.
About this occupation: Respiratory Therapists
The U.S. Department of Labor's O*NET database describes the work of Respiratory Therapists this way: "Assess, treat, and care for patients with breathing disorders. Assume primary responsibility for all respiratory care modalities, including the supervision of respiratory therapy technicians. Initiate and conduct therapeutic procedures; maintain patient records; and select, assemble, check, and operate equipment."
Core tasks recorded by O*NET include: "Set up and operate devices, such as mechanical ventilators, therapeutic gas administration apparatus, environmental control systems, or aerosol generators, following specified parameters of treatment"; "Provide emergency care, such as artificial respiration, external cardiac massage, or assistance with cardiopulmonary resuscitation"; "Determine requirements for treatment, such as type, method and duration of therapy, precautions to be taken, or medication and dosages, compatible with physicians' orders"; "Monitor patient's physiological responses to therapy, such as vital signs, arterial blood gases, or blood chemistry changes, and consult with physician if adverse reactions occur".
Job outlook for Respiratory Therapists
The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects national employment in this occupation to grow from 142,000 jobs in 2025 to 154,200 in 2035, a change of +8.5%, faster than the 3.5% projected for all occupations. The projection counts 8,600 openings a year on average, including positions created by growth and positions left by workers who retire or move to another occupation; that equals 6.1% of current employment each year.
Typical entry-level education: associate's degree. BLS lists a national median annual wage of $82,280 for this occupation; the Bronx County, NY median of $110,490 is 34.3% above it.
How pay in Bronx County, NY compares
Compared with the New York average
Bronx County, NY pays above the state benchmark. The New York employment-weighted average for Respiratory Therapists is $105,409; the local median of $110,490 beats it by $5,081, or 4.8%. Within New York, Bronx County, NY already has the highest median we track for this job.
Compared with the national average
The national employment-weighted average for Respiratory Therapists is $87,028 across the contiguous United States. At $110,490, Bronx County, NY pays $23,462 more, which is 27.0% above 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 Bronx County, NY
Among the 671 occupations with published wages in Bronx County, NY, Respiratory Therapists ranks number 121 by median pay, ahead of about 82% of them. The best-paying occupation we track here is Anesthesiologists at $460,800 a year, which is $350,310 more than the median for Respiratory Therapists.
From gross pay to take-home pay
A salary of $110,490 does not arrive in full. We model a single filer with wage income only, the standard deduction and tax-year 2025 rules, and we keep the three tax layers apart: federal income tax, FICA (Social Security and Medicare) and state income tax. Together they take $29,790 a year, which leaves $80,700, or $6,725 a month.
Put another way, of every $100 earned, about $27 goes to taxes and $73 reaches the paycheck. The overall effective tax rate is 27.0%.
Federal income tax
After the $15,750 standard deduction, taxable income is $94,740. 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 $15,757, an effective 14.3% 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 $6,850 on this salary. Medicare takes 1.45%, or $1,602. FICA totals $8,452, which is 7.6% of gross pay.
State income tax in New York
New York income tax on this salary is $5,581 a year, or 5.1% of gross pay, after the state's own deductions and exemptions are applied. That is 35% of the federal income tax bill, and it comes out to $465 a month. Local taxes such as county or city income taxes are not included, so a few jurisdictions may withhold slightly more.
A cross-check with IRS data for Bronx County, NY
IRS Statistics of Income data for Bronx County, NY show an average adjusted gross income of $47,417 per return and an average effective federal income tax rate of 9.5% across all filers. Filers in the $100,000 to under $200,000 bracket, where this salary falls, paid an average of 12.5%, compared with the 14.3% 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 Bronx County, NY
Take-home pay only means something next to what life costs. We price four basics for one adult in Bronx County, NY: a one-bedroom apartment, food, home energy and gasoline. All of them are converted to annual figures first, then compared with the $80,700 of take-home pay.
Rent
The HUD Fair Market Rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Bronx County, NY is $2,729 a month, or $32,748 a year. A two-bedroom costs $2,971 a month. For Respiratory Therapists, a one-bedroom absorbs 40.6% of take-home pay and 29.6% 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 3.1% of gross pay for Respiratory Therapists in Bronx County, NY. It is a thrifty budget with no restaurant meals, so treat it as a floor.
Energy and gasoline
Using New York residential prices from the Energy Information Administration and national household averages for consumption, electricity costs about $2,581 a year and other home energy such as natural gas about $653, for $3,235 in total. Gasoline in New York averages $3.17 per gallon; at about 463 gallons a year (11,106 miles at 24 miles per gallon) fuel adds $1,467.
What is left over
Add the four basics together and living costs come to $40,885 a year, 51% of take-home pay. That leaves $39,814 a year, or $3,318 a month, for savings, transportation beyond fuel, health care, debt and everything else. That margin equals 36.0% of gross pay, a comfortable cushion by common budgeting rules.
Local housing and commute data for Bronx County, NY
The budget above covers rent, food, energy and gasoline. Three more local facts shape what a paycheck buys in Bronx County, NY: 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 Bronx County, NY, set beside the New York and national medians.
Property taxes in Bronx County, NY
Homeowners in Bronx County, NY pay a median of $5,447 a year in real estate taxes, 17% below the New York median of $6,582 and 75% above the U.S. median of $3,119. Against a median home value of $529,500, the median tax bill is 1.03% of that value (the ratio of the two county medians). For a worker paid the local Respiratory Therapists median of $110,490, a tax bill of that size would equal 4.9% of gross pay, which matters for anyone planning to buy rather than rent.
Rents, home prices and household income in Bronx County, NY
Renters in Bronx County, NY pay a median gross rent of $1,458 a month in the Census survey, 10% below the New York median of $1,621. HUD's Fair Market Rent for a one-bedroom apartment, which this site uses in the budget, is $2,729 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 $529,500, 25% above the New York median of $423,800. Median household income is $48,676, 43% below the New York median of $85,974, so a year of one-bedroom Fair Market Rent equals 67.3% of that income.
Commuting in Bronx County, NY
Workers in Bronx County, NY who travel to a workplace spend an average of 43.3 minutes each way, 33% above the New York average of 32.6. For someone who commutes five days a week, that is 7.2 hours of round-trip travel every week, a cost the budget does not price. 8.9% of workers in Bronx County, NY work from home, compared with 15.1% nationally, which removes the commute for them.
Can Respiratory Therapists afford to live in Bronx County, NY?
The 30% rent guideline
A common rule of thumb says rent should stay under 30% of gross income. For a gross salary of $110,490 that ceiling is $2,762 a month. The one-bedroom Fair Market Rent of $2,729 is $33 under it, so rent fits the guideline. Put as a wage, covering a one-bedroom at the 30% guideline takes $52.48 an hour; the median for Respiratory Therapists is $53.12, which is 1% above that mark. Another way to see it: at $38.80 of take-home pay an hour, a one-bedroom takes about 16.2 working hours every week.
Splitting a two-bedroom
Sharing a two-bedroom at $2,971 a month means $1,486 each. Compared with renting a one-bedroom alone, that saves $14,922 a year. With a roommate, the yearly margin after the basics becomes $54,736.
How fast you can save
At $3,318 a month of margin, building a $10,000 emergency fund would take about 4 months. Setting aside half of the margin stretches the same goal to about 8 months. These figures ignore interest, raises and any spending beyond the four basics.
Frequently asked questions about Respiratory Therapists pay in Bronx County, NY
What is the hourly wage for Respiratory Therapists in Bronx County, NY?
The median is $53.12 per hour, based on $110,490 a year over 2,080 hours. Hourly pay runs from about $41.87 at the 10th percentile to $63.22 at the 90th percentile.
What is the take-home pay for Respiratory Therapists in Bronx County, NY?
After federal income tax, FICA and state income tax, the median salary of $110,490 becomes $80,700 a year. That is $6,725 a month, $3,104 every two weeks or $1,552 a week.
What percentage of pay goes to taxes for Respiratory Therapists in Bronx County, NY?
Total taxes are $29,790 a year, an effective rate of 27.0%: $15,757 federal income tax, $8,452 FICA and $5,581 New York income tax.
Is pay for Respiratory Therapists in Bronx County, NY above the New York average?
Yes. The local median of $110,490 is +4.8% versus the New York average of $105,409, a difference of $5,081 a year.
Is a one-bedroom rent affordable on the median Respiratory Therapists salary in Bronx County, NY?
A one-bedroom costs $2,729 a month against take-home pay of $6,725, which is 40.6% of take-home pay. That meets the 30%-of-gross guideline, which allows up to $2,762 a month.
How much is left after rent, food and energy for Respiratory Therapists in Bronx County, NY?
About $3,318 a month ($39,814 a year) remains after a one-bedroom apartment, food, home energy and gasoline, which together cost $40,885 a year.
What hourly wage covers a one-bedroom in Bronx County, NY at the 30% guideline?
$52.48 an hour for a full-time schedule, calculated as the $32,748 annual rent divided by 0.30 and by 2,080 hours. The median for Respiratory Therapists is $53.12.
How we calculated these numbers
Wages are May 2025 medians from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics survey for the New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ 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 New York 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.