Occupation / job
Separating, Filtering, Clarifying, Precipitating, and Still Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders
Median annual pay. Half earn less than this.
Hourly at a standard 2,080-hour year. We do not yet have unpaid-time or cost data for this, so this is not an adjusted figure.
The middle half. A quarter earn below this range.
Source: BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025 · view
What this figure cannot tell you
It covers people EMPLOYED in this occupation. Anyone who trained for it and was never hired is not in the median above, and neither is anyone doing the work self-employed. No verified count of qualified people exists for this occupation, so this page shows none rather than an estimate. Why that matters · The occupations where we could source it
Who this suits
Separating, Filtering, Clarifying, Precipitating, and Still Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders pays $51,610 at the midpoint against $50,020 across all occupations. The headline argues neither for nor against it; the case has to be made on the spread, the entry cost and what the day is actually like.
60,100 people are employed in this work. Big enough for a real market in every major metro, small enough that experience in Separating, Filtering, Clarifying, Precipitating, and Still Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders is still a distinguishing thing to have.
This work suits people who can hold quality steady through repetition, which is a real skill and one that machines have not entirely taken.
No verified preparation time is on file for Separating, Filtering, Clarifying, Precipitating, and Still Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders. The wage survey behind every figure on this page asks employers what they pay, not what they required, so the honest answer here is that we do not know.
Who should not do this
Between $44,410 and $63,930 there is $19,520, a ratio of 1.4x. Tight distributions are predictable, and predictable cuts both ways: little risk of being badly underpaid, little prospect of doing much better.
At $44,410, or $21.35 an hour, the bottom quarter of this work lands within $5,610 of the $50,020 all-occupation midpoint — an unusually solid floor.
Avoid it if you need a career shape; many of these roles are flat by design.
There is no failure rate on this page because there is nothing honest to divide by. BLS counted 60,100 people employed as Separating, Filtering, Clarifying, Precipitating, and Still Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders; it did not count the people who trained for it and are doing something else, and a rate built without that denominator would be a number we made up.
What the spread tells you
Top quarter to bottom quarter is 1.4x. In a band that narrow, $51,610 is a genuinely representative number for Separating, Filtering, Clarifying, Precipitating, and Still Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders and the main variable left is where you live.
In cash terms the middle half of Separating, Filtering, Clarifying, Precipitating, and Still Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders runs $44,410 to $63,930 — $19,520 a year between the 25th and 75th percentiles, against a midpoint of $51,610.
Getting to $63,930, the 75th percentile, is worth $12,320 a year more than the $51,610 midpoint and $19,520 more than the $44,410 a quarter of Separating, Filtering, Clarifying, Precipitating, and Still Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders settle for.
The distance from the midpoint up to $63,930 is $12,320 — well over the $7,200 down to $44,410. Distributions leaning this way mean the median understates what the upper half of Separating, Filtering, Clarifying, Precipitating, and Still Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders earns, and half the field is in that upper half.
On a 2,080-hour year the midpoint for Separating, Filtering, Clarifying, Precipitating, and Still Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders is $24.81 an hour. The quarters sit at $21.35 and $30.73, and the all-occupation midpoint at $24.04.
What these figures are, and what they are not
The $51,610 figure is what employers pay employees. It is before tax and before deductions, it excludes the self-employed entirely, and it says nothing about anyone who does this work on their own account.
The hourly number on this page is $51,610 divided by a 2,080-hour year and nothing more. We hold no unpaid-hours or cost data for Separating, Filtering, Clarifying, Precipitating, and Still Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders, so it is arithmetic rather than an effective rate.
How this is calculated · Self-employment failure rates · What credentials cost and pay back · Look up something else