Employment & Wages (By Jurisdiction)

Employment & Wages — By Jurisdiction

BLS Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages, summed across all ~1,029 industry codes on file -- ranked by average weekly wage, not raw employment, since raw employment mostly just tracks county size. One quarter (2025) on file, presented as a single snapshot, not yet a trend.

Ranked by average weekly wage, not total employment -- total employment mostly just tracks how big a place is, which isn't news. A small county at the top isn't a math artifact: it's often one dominant, well-paying employer or industry setting the whole county's average, which is a real thing about that place, not noise to filter out. One quarter of BLS data (2025) is on file, so this is a snapshot, not a trend yet.

52 jurisdictions ranked, highest average weekly wage first

#	Jurisdiction	Avg Weekly Wage	Employment	Establishments	Counties
1	District of Columbia (DC)	$2,510	3,443,362	307,515	1
2	New York (NY)	$2,175	49,929,571	3,861,707	62
3	Massachusetts (MA)	$2,075	18,052,067	1,445,604	14
4	Washington (WA)	$1,963	17,209,986	1,327,432	39
5	Connecticut (CT)	$1,890	8,306,246	838,299	9
6	California (CA)	$1,847	94,737,506	10,392,331	58
7	Colorado (CO)	$1,683	14,514,213	1,345,577	64
8	New Jersey (NJ)	$1,674	21,249,974	1,625,510	21
9	Delaware (DE)	$1,640	1,596,905	258,432	3
10	Illinois (IL)	$1,633	28,433,345	1,822,339	102
11	Virginia (VA)	$1,590	17,213,890	1,441,414	133
12	Texas (TX)	$1,573	65,219,289	4,220,986	254
13	Maryland (MD)	$1,571	11,616,111	905,108	24
14	Minnesota (MN)	$1,527	13,114,340	943,175	87
15	Georgia (GA)	$1,468	21,590,702	1,956,737	159
16	New Hampshire (NH)	$1,451	2,892,741	268,047	10
17	Pennsylvania (PA)	$1,420	26,648,310	1,838,529	67
18	North Carolina (NC)	$1,420	20,791,542	1,781,383	100
19	Arizona (AZ)	$1,399	16,987,956	1,194,834	15
20	Alaska (AK)	$1,391	1,330,351	114,860	30
21	Florida (FL)	$1,390	50,023,940	4,445,922	67
22	Oregon (OR)	$1,389	9,034,083	903,442	36
23	Hawaii (HI)	$1,354	2,518,879	253,350	4
24	Rhode Island (RI)	$1,353	2,263,579	267,528	5
25	Utah (UT)	$1,351	9,102,866	829,579	29
26	Michigan (MI)	$1,344	18,139,668	1,358,238	83
27	Tennessee (TN)	$1,321	13,615,088	1,010,999	95
28	Nevada (NV)	$1,320	8,061,839	552,003	17
29	Ohio (OH)	$1,311	24,686,372	1,702,761	88
30	North Dakota (ND)	$1,287	1,610,964	176,315	53
31	Vermont (VT)	$1,273	1,146,920	190,420	14
32	Wisconsin (WI)	$1,267	10,648,389	895,941	72
33	Indiana (IN)	$1,259	12,626,575	900,282	92
34	Missouri (MO)	$1,256	12,280,625	1,132,462	115
35	Iowa (IA)	$1,245	5,131,610	557,305	99
36	Kansas (KS)	$1,240	5,657,736	480,425	105
37	Alabama (AL)	$1,222	7,734,895	719,775	67
38	Kentucky (KY)	$1,205	6,322,808	780,885	120
39	Oklahoma (OK)	$1,203	6,347,483	613,190	77
40	Wyoming (WY)	$1,199	912,919	157,308	23
41	Maine (ME)	$1,198	2,845,417	345,757	16
42	Louisiana (LA)	$1,195	7,677,519	838,455	64
43	Nebraska (NE)	$1,191	3,945,240	319,270	93
44	South Dakota (SD)	$1,186	1,457,718	200,255	66
45	South Carolina (SC)	$1,153	8,271,637	800,610	46
46	New Mexico (NM)	$1,150	3,674,814	312,920	33
47	Montana (MT)	$1,149	2,038,467	292,463	56
48	Idaho (ID)	$1,121	3,960,279	512,119	44
49	West Virginia (WV)	$1,084	2,465,332	287,743	55
50	Arkansas (AR)	$1,059	4,871,653	432,764	75
51	Mississippi (MS)	$958	4,053,399	342,765	82
52	Puerto Rico (PR)	$679	4,067,524	312,198	78