Salary by Metro

Published by Salary by Metro · Updated October 12, 2026

Negotiating with wage data

Bring the local median and the middle half of the range. Then ask which part of that range the offer matches.

A transit bus driver standing beside a bus at a rest stop in Denali
Denali transit bus driver Gary at Teklanika Rest Stop, August 29, 2019. Photograph by Emily Mesner, National Park Service. Wikimedia Commons · Public domain

A wage table is useful in a negotiation because it is not your employer's number and it is not yours. The May 2025 Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics estimates come from a federal survey of establishments. They describe what wage-and-salary workers in an occupation were paid in a metropolitan area. They do not describe your performance, your shift, or the benefits attached to one job.

The three figures worth putting on the table

Start with the median for the occupation in the metro where the work is done. Then add the 25th and 75th percentiles, the middle half of local wages. An offer below the 25th percentile is in the lower quarter of measured pay. An offer above the 75th is in the upper quarter. The 10th and 90th are context, not targets. Most workers are not at either end.

Compare that local median with the state median and the national median, which the job page does in one sentence. A metro can pay more than the country because the work is scarce there, because the industry mix is different, or because prices are higher. Those are different reasons, and only the last one is a cost question. The cost-adjusted comparison uses regional price parities for that second question. Do not fold it into the wage table and pretend it is already in the BLS wage.

Questions that stay tied to the table

  • Which percentile of the local distribution does this base wage match?
  • Is the comparison the same occupation title BLS uses, or a broader company title that mixes several occupations?
  • Is the workplace inside this metropolitan area? A metro wage covers the whole area, including suburbs, not only the central city.
  • What is paid on top of the wage? OEWS wages do not include overtime premiums in the way a paycheck might, and they are not a total of bonus, equity, or benefits.

The survey counts wage and salary jobs at establishments. It does not include the self-employed, owners, partners in unincorporated firms, household workers, or unpaid family workers. That matters for occupations where a lot of the work is independent. A low or high median is still a fact about employees. It is a poor description of a solo practice.

Use the annual wage when BLS published one. Do not turn an hourly wage into a yearly salary by multiplying by 2,080 unless you know the hours. Some occupations are published on an annual basis only, including elementary school teachers, whose national median is $63,970 and whose hourly wage is not published. The page says so when that is the case.

A careful way to say it

You can say: in the May 2025 estimates, the median annual wage for this occupation in this metro is the figure on the page, and the middle half of wages runs from the 25th percentile to the 75th. Then stop. The survey does not know the budget for the job, and it does not rank you inside the occupation. Experience, credentials, shift differentials, and the employer's pay band are outside the table. The table's job is to keep the conversation attached to a published distribution instead of a round number someone remembered.

If the cell you need says the wage is not available, do not fill the blank with the national median or with a neighboring metro. BLS withheld that estimate. Use a larger geography that is published, such as the state or the nation, and say that is what you are using.

Compare two metros after prices · Hourly and annual wages

Questions this page answers

Should I ask for the 90th percentile wage?

The 90th percentile is the wage above which only 10 percent of workers in the occupation and area are paid. It is a high point in the May 2025 distribution, not a standard offer. The median and the 25th-to-75th range are the figures that describe the center of local pay.

Do BLS wages include bonuses and benefits?

OEWS wage estimates are wages for the occupation, not a total compensation package. They are not a sum of bonus, equity, health insurance, or retirement contributions. Treat those as separate from the percentile you are quoting.

Which geography should I cite?

Cite the metropolitan area where the establishment is, using the official BLS area name. If the job is not in a metro, the state or national estimate is the published fallback. A national median is the wrong citation for a job that sits in a metro with its own published wage.