Do you earn a living wage in Thurston County? Here’s how much you need in 2025
Does the amount of money you’re earning at work equal a living wage?
It depends on multiple factors, including where you live and who’s in your household.
In Thurston County, an adult living alone needs to make $8.21 an hour above the state minimum wage of $16.66 to cover basic needs and be self-sufficient, according to a living wage calculator from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
What about homes with more than one adult, or with kids? What’s their bottom line?
Here’s a breakdown of what makes for a living wage in Thurston County:
What is considered a living wage in Thurston County in 2025?
A living wage “is the hourly rate that an individual in a household must earn to support themselves and/or their family, working full-time, or 2,080 hours per year,” according to MIT.
Here’s how that looks for various household types in Thurston County, per the calculator:
- Single adult with no children: $24.87
- Single adult with one child: $45
- Single adult with two children: $57.49
- Single adult with three children: $73.31
- Two working adults with no children: $17.56
- Two working adults with one child: $25.07
- Two working adults with two children: $31.23
- Two working adults with three children: $38.34
How much does it cost to live in Thurston County?
Another way to look at the numbers is: a single adult living alone in the county needs at least $51,720 annually before taxes to afford food, housing, medical care, the internet and other basic expenses, according to MIT.
That total goes up to $93,600 for the single parent of one child.
In the county seat of Olympia, the median household income is $76,930 and the average family size is 2.80 people, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
Many people in the area work in government, the state Employment Security Department said, and other major job sectors range from health care to retail trade.
For people in Thurston County, housing and child care, if applicable, are among the biggest expenses, according to MIT’s calculations. Transportation also is a top expense.
For a household with two working adults and three kids, those three expenses add up to $86,772, per the calculator. Add in food, and the total exceeds $103,000.
Can I check the living wage in the state or another county?
The MIT calculator covers more than 3,100 counties, nearly 400 metro areas and all 50 states.
For example, for Washington state as a whole, it shows that a single adult needs to earn $26.36 an hour to afford basic necessities. In King County, which includes Seattle, a living wage for a single adult is $30.82 an hour.
That threshold is $21.11 an hour across the Cascades in Spokane County.
How does MIT calculate living wages in the US?
The MIT calculator draws data from a number of different sources — ranging from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics to the U.S. Department of Agriculture — to determine the cost of basic needs in different areas.
It also factors in taxes and accounts for 12 different family types.
The data was last updated in February.
This story was originally published August 17, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
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