Home › Data

How the numbers are built

Every wage and employment figure on this site comes from one public survey, rebuilt from the source file by a script, with nothing typed in by hand.

Source

U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS), May 2025 estimates, cross-industry, all ownerships; state estimates plus the national estimate. Files: oesm25st.zip and oesm25nat.zip. Retrieved 2026-09-16.

OEWS is a semiannual survey of about 1.1 million establishments, combined over three years into each annual estimate. It covers wage-and-salary workers only; the self-employed are not in these numbers.

What the columns mean

• Median: half the workers in the occupation earn less, half earn more. The figure to use as "typical pay".
• Percentiles: the 10th and 90th bracket the working range; the 25th and 75th bracket the middle half.
• Mean: the arithmetic average. Top earners pull it above the median, so it overstates typical pay.
• Annual: BLS multiplies the hourly rate by 2,080 hours. For occupations paid by the year, the annual figure is reported directly.
• Employed: the estimated number of wage-and-salary workers in the occupation in that area.
• Per 1,000 jobs: employment in the occupation for every 1,000 jobs in the area.
• Location quotient: the area's concentration of the occupation divided by the national concentration. 1.00 is average; 2.00 is twice as concentrated.

Suppressed and capped cells

A cell BLS did not publish (its estimate did not meet publication standards) shows as "not published". A wage at or above the survey's ceiling, $115.00 an hour or $239,200 a year, shows as "or more". Neither is filled in from another source.

Coverage

5 occupations (Electricians (47-2111); Plumbers, Pipefitters, and Steamfitters (47-2152); Heating, Air Conditioning, and Refrigeration Mechanics and Installers (49-9021); Welders, Cutters, Solderers, and Brazers (51-4121); Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers (53-3032)) across 50 states, the District of Columbia, and 0 territories.

Refresh

BLS publishes new OEWS estimates each spring. The build script downloads the new files, rewrites the data set, and every page is regenerated; the vintage in the footer changes when that happens.