Therapist Salary in New Jersey: Counselors, MFTs and Social Workers

Set against their own national figures, the three New Jersey medians move in one direction but not by one amount.

The counselor median of $62,820 is $3,470 above the national $59,350; the social worker median of $66,590 is $6,310 above the national $60,280; and the family therapist median of $92,150 is $25,210 above the national $66,940.

The ordering matches the national one — family therapists highest, social workers next, counselors last — but every gap between the three is wider here.

Nationally the family therapist median leads the counselor median by $7,590, or 13%; in New Jersey the lead is $29,330, or 47%, and the lead over social workers is $25,560 against $6,660 nationally.

No single figure would show how far apart the three sit.

New Jersey counselors sit above the national distribution at every published point, and the premium is steady rather than edge-loaded.

The 10th percentile of $40,630 is 4% above the national figure, the 25th of $49,290 is 5% above, the median of $62,820 is 6% above, and the 75th of $81,900 and the 90th of $104,310 are each 7% above.

The spread is close to the national spread: the middle half spans $32,610 against $29,430 nationally, and the 10th-to-90th span is $63,680 against $58,650.

New Jersey ranks 13th of the 51 jurisdictions that publish a median for this occupation.

For someone weighing a counselor offer, the state median is a higher benchmark than the national one at every rung of the distribution.

This is a combined occupation, so the figures describe every kind of counselor it pools, not one licence.

Marriage and family therapists are the outlier of the three.

The median of $92,150 is 38% above the national median of $66,940, and New Jersey ranks 2nd of the 45 jurisdictions that publish a median for this occupation; BLS estimates 4,040 employed here, 3rd of the 40 that publish an employment estimate.

The lift runs from the floor up: the 10th percentile of $62,150 is 39% above the national figure, the 25th of $74,070 is 48% above, and the 75th of $101,090 is 8% above.

The ceiling breaks the pattern: the 90th percentile of $110,990 is 10% below the national figure of $123,730, and the top of the distribution is compressed, with $9,900 between the 75th and 90th percentiles against $29,890 nationally.

The hourly median is $44.30 against $32.18 nationally.

OEWS does not say why the top decile trails, and this page does not guess.

Mental health and substance abuse social workers in New Jersey have a median of $66,590, 10% above the national median of $60,280.

The floor is tight and the climb out of it is steep: $2,430 separates the 10th percentile of $45,180 from the 25th of $47,610, against $7,330 nationally, and the move from the 25th percentile to the median is $18,980.

The 10th percentile is 14% above its national figure, while the 25th is only 1% above.

The 75th percentile of $84,700 is 6% above the national figure, and the 90th of $102,130 sits 2% below the national $104,170.

The middle half spans $37,090 against $32,660 nationally.

BLS estimates 2,420 employed in New Jersey, 16th of the 50 jurisdictions that publish an employment estimate for this occupation.

Start with the occupation the job would be counted in, and read the offer against that row.

The New Jersey hourly medians are $30.20 for counselors, $44.30 for marriage and family therapists and $32.02 for mental health and substance abuse social workers, against national hourly medians of $28.53, $32.18 and $28.98.

A counselor offer at the state median of $62,820 is 6% above the national counselor median of $59,350; a family therapist offer at $92,150 is $25,210 above its national median; and the social worker median of $66,590 is $6,310 above its national figure.

The same salary can sit at very different positions in the three distributions, which is why this page keeps the rows separate.

A percentile is a position in the state distribution, not a pay step, so an offer at the 25th percentile says where it sits among New Jersey jobs in that occupation, not a judgement about the person hired.

None of the three rows is a licence figure.

The counselor row pools LPCs and LACs with substance abuse and behavioral disorder counselors, and BLS publishes no LPC-only or LAC-only median for New Jersey.

The family therapist row is the closest to a single licence, an occupation of its own for marriage and family therapists, whom New Jersey licenses as the LMFT with an LAMFT associate tier, but OEWS does not split it by licence stage, so it cannot say what an LAMFT earns.

Clinical social workers holding the LCSW are counted either in this social worker row or in healthcare social work, depending on the setting, so the $66,590 median does not describe every LCSW.