# Salary by Metro > Median wages, percentile ranges, and employment for occupations in U.S. metropolitan areas, from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025, released May 15, 2026. Salary by Metro is an independent reading of public statistics. It is not the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Bureau of Economic Analysis, the IRS, or the Tax Foundation. A withheld wage is not treated as zero and is not replaced with a national, state, or nearby-metro figure. ## Sources - [Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025](https://www.bls.gov/oes/tables.htm): released May 15, 2026. News release: https://www.bls.gov/news.release/ocwage.htm. Technical notes: https://www.bls.gov/oes/2025/may/oes_tec.htm. - [Regional price parities, 2024](https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area): U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, Regional Price Parities by state and metropolitan area, 2024, released February 19, 2026. The United States equals 100. - [IRS Revenue Procedure 2025-32](https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-drop/rp-25-32.pdf): 2026 federal rate schedules and standard deduction, used for the take-home estimate. - [Tax Foundation, state income tax rates for 2026](https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/state/state-income-tax-rates-2026/): state brackets compiled from statutes and forms, published February 17, 2026. - [Census Bureau 2024 Gazetteer, CBSA internal points](https://www2.census.gov/geo/docs/maps-data/data/gazetteer/2024_Gazetteer/2024_Gaz_cbsa_national.zip): U.S. Census Bureau, 2024 Gazetteer Files, Core Based Statistical Areas, internal points (INTPTLAT, INTPTLONG). Nearby means within 200 statute miles. ## Hubs - [Home](https://salarybymetro.com/): look up a wage by occupation and metro. - [Methodology](https://salarybymetro.com/methodology): sources, unpublished cells, price adjustment, take-home method, indexing rule, and update cadence. - [Jobs](https://salarybymetro.com/jobs): 830 detailed occupations. - [Metros](https://salarybymetro.com/metros): 393 metropolitan areas. 25 largest are indexed. - [States](https://salarybymetro.com/states): 54 state and territory areas. - [Compare](https://salarybymetro.com/compare): two metros after 2024 regional price parities. - [Take-home pay](https://salarybymetro.com/take-home-pay): 2026 estimate after federal income tax, FICA, and state income tax. Not a tax return. - [Guides](https://salarybymetro.com/guides): how to read the tables. - [Contact](https://salarybymetro.com/contact): hello@salarybymetro.com. ## Guides - [How to read a wage percentile](https://salarybymetro.com/guides/how-to-read-wage-percentiles): What the 10th, 25th, median, 75th, and 90th percentile wages mean in the Bureau of Labor Statistics May 2025 wage tables. - [Negotiating with wage data](https://salarybymetro.com/guides/negotiating-with-wage-data): How to use a BLS median, a percentile range, and a metro comparison when you discuss pay, without treating the survey as an offer. - [Median pay and mean pay](https://salarybymetro.com/guides/median-and-mean-pay): Why the May 2025 wage pages lead with the median, and what the mean is telling you when it sits above or below that middle wage. - [Hourly wages and annual wages](https://salarybymetro.com/guides/hourly-versus-annual-wages): When the May 2025 OEWS tables publish an hourly wage, an annual wage, or only one of the two, and why this site does not multiply by 2,080. - [Comparing pay across metros](https://salarybymetro.com/guides/comparing-pay-across-metros): How to compare a May 2025 wage in two metropolitan areas after Bureau of Economic Analysis regional price parities for 2024. - [How take-home pay is estimated](https://salarybymetro.com/guides/how-take-home-pay-is-estimated): The 2026 federal brackets, FICA, and state income-tax schedules behind the take-home estimate, and the cases the estimate leaves out. - [What a metro area includes](https://salarybymetro.com/guides/what-a-metro-area-includes): How the May 2025 OEWS metropolitan areas are defined, why the official title includes suburbs, and how multi-state areas are compared with a state. - [When a wage is not published](https://salarybymetro.com/guides/when-a-wage-is-not-published): Why a May 2025 OEWS cell is blank, how that differs from an occupation that is not in the metro, and why a blank is not filled in. - [Cost-of-living adjustments and merit raises](https://salarybymetro.com/guides/cola-vs-merit-raises): How a Social Security cost-of-living adjustment differs from a merit raise, and how the CPI-U and the Employment Cost Index measure prices and pay. - [Cost of labor and cost of living](https://salarybymetro.com/guides/cost-of-labor-vs-cost-of-living): Why a May 2025 OEWS wage and a 2024 BEA regional price parity answer different questions, and how to divide a wage by the price parity. - [Registered nurse pay by metro](https://salarybymetro.com/guides/registered-nurse-pay-by-metro): How to read May 2025 OEWS pay for registered nurses: the national percentiles, a metro page, shift differentials, take-home, and price-adjusted comparisons. ## Indexing An occupation-and-metro page is indexed when the May 2025 median is published, employment is at least 7,400, the metro is one of the 25 largest by all-occupations employment, and the page can show a percentile spread, a national comparison, a price-adjusted wage, and a metro within 200 miles with a published median for that occupation. 2,068 occupation-and-metro pages are indexed. 141,015 occupation-and-metro pages exist. Pages that miss the rule use noindex and are omitted from the sitemap. Staff pages /admin, /login, /dashboard, and /account are noindex and disallowed in robots.txt.