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If you are considering a career in counseling, your paycheck is probably at least a little way down the list of things you are thinking about. You’re the kind of empathetic, caring, considerate person who is mostly in the game to help other people who are struggling. You probably already do that for friends and family for nothing at all.
But you have to eat, put a roof over your head, and, almost certainly, pay off some substantial college loans once you get into the counseling game. So you definitely need to be thinking about how much counselors make, and what you can do to get the most out of your counseling career – and your counselor salary?
Instead, they define three different broad groups of counselors, and track the salary statistics for each of them independently:
Each different type of counselor has their own unique challenges and job environment, leading to different salary expectations.
Each of them also has their own unique educational and training path, and similarly, they each have a different average counselor salary.
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What is the average salary for a counselor?
The median annual counselor salary in the three main categories that year were:
What type of counselors get paid the most?
To determine what type of counselor gets paid the most, you have to go past the average salary levels for each group and instead look at the top end of those professions. The results are a bit different for who gets the highest paycheck in the top ten percent of each group:
You can expect the most experienced and best-educated people in each category to hit those high salary levels.
Where You Work Has a Big Impact on Counselor Salary
You already understand that the average cost of living varies from state to state and town to town. That has an impact on what people get paid in every type of job, including as counselors.
Withonline counseling degrees, of course, you can live just about anywhere you want and get the same great education you would if you relocated.
Do counselors make good money?
Whether or not counselors make good money depends a lot on who you are comparing them to. Geography has a big impact on whether counseling work is one of the better paying jobs in your area. For example, the annual mean wage in Washington is$72,350. School and career counselors there make $65,550 per year, which is less than average. But in California, with an annual mean wage of$73,220, school counselors make $78,250 — a comfortable margin above average.
Counselor Salary is Affected By Who You Work For
Becoming a licensed counseloris a big boost for your salary prospects, of course. Each state has different requirements and titles for the different types of counselors. You will have to check with your state licensing board to find out what kind of education, post-graduate training, and what tests you might need to pass in order to practice. Each state may also have different rules about what kind of activities require a license in the first place.
Does Becoming Certified Boost Your Counselor Salary?
Some states accept certification in lieu of licensure, recognizing national certification as meeting equivalent requirements for addiction counselors.
Under any circumstances, professional certification is a great way to boost your potential counselor salary level. As a mark of extra expertise in the field, both employers and clients will recognize that you are bringing more value to the table than counselors without it.
The big player in national counseling certification is NBCC, the National Board for Certified Counselors. The National Certified Counselor (NCC) is the most basic and popular certification they offer. It verifies that you have earned a graduate degree in the field from an accredited university, passed a rigorous national exam, and have verified work experience in the field. And you can be sure that with all that knowledge and experience to back you up, you’ll be eligible for some of the best counselor salaries available.
Of course, like all counselors, you’ll measure your real compensation in terms of success. How many people you help through the dark forest of depression, how many addicts you set on the path to recovery, how many injured clients are able to return to meaningful, fulfilling lives. Certification helps you achieve those goals, too, but the extra bit it adds to your salary doesn’t hurt either!
2022 US Bureau of Labor Statistics job market trends and salary figures forsubstance abuse, behavioral disorder, and mental health counselors,rehabilitation counselors,school and career counselors, andcounselors (all other)are based on national data, not school-specific information. Conditions in your area may vary. Data accessed June 2023.
