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News Release Information

24-1532-PHI
Tuesday, July 23, 2024

Contacts Technical information: Media contact:

Occupational Employment and Wages in Charleston — May 2023

Workers in the Charleston, WV Metropolitan Statistical Area had an average (mean) hourly wage of $25.93 in May 2023, compared to the nationwide average of $31.48, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Regional Commissioner Alexandra Hall Bovee noted that higher paying major occupational groups included management ($48.83), and healthcare practitioners and technical ($45.17). Lower paying occupational groups included food preparation and serving related ($13.43), building and grounds cleaning and maintenance ($14.61), and personal care and services ($14.99). (See table A.)

Office and administrative support occupations accounted for 13.9 percent of Charleston area employment, followed by healthcare practitioners and technical occupations (9.6 percent). Major occupational groups on the lower end of local employment included arts, design, entertainment, sports, and media (0.8 percent); and life, physical, and social science (1.2 percent).

Table A. Occupational employment and wages by major occupational group, United States and the Charleston metropolitan area, May 2023
Major occupational group Percent of total employment Mean hourly wage ($)
United States Charleston United States Charleston

Total, all occupations

100.0 100.0 31.48 25.93

Management

6.9 6.5 66.23 48.83

Business and financial operations

6.6 5.4 43.55 34.49

Computer and mathematical

3.4 2.5 54.39 36.92

Architecture and engineering

1.7 1.6 47.64 40.15

Life, physical, and social science

0.9 1.2 42.24 32.32

Community and social service

1.6 2.2 28.36 22.02

Legal

0.8 1.4 64.34 (1)

Educational instruction and library

5.8 5.2 31.92 23.79

Arts, design, entertainment, sports, and media

1.4 0.8 36.31 23.73

Healthcare practitioners and technical

6.1 9.6 49.07 45.17

Healthcare support

4.7 5.9 18.37 15.04

Protective service

2.3 4.3 27.74 18.83

Food preparation and serving related

8.7 7.7 16.58 13.43

Building and grounds cleaning and maintenance

2.9 2.8 18.43 14.61

Personal care and service

2.0 1.5 18.48 14.99

Sales and related

8.8 8.0 25.62 18.03

Office and administrative support

12.2 13.9 23.05 19.60

Farming, fishing, and forestry

0.3 0.1 19.22 19.31

Construction and extraction

4.1 4.7 29.57 27.85

Installation, maintenance, and repair

3.9 4.8 28.13 24.83

Production

5.8 2.9 22.90 21.84

Transportation and material moving

9.1 7.1 22.45 19.54

Footnotes:
(1) Estimate not released.

One occupational group—office and administrative support—was chosen to illustrate the diversity of data available for any of the 22 major occupational categories. Charleston had 14,260 jobs in office and administrative support, accounting for 13.9 percent of local area employment, compared to the 12.2-percent share nationally. The average hourly wage for this occupational group locally was $19.60, compared to the national wage of $23.05.

Some of the larger detailed occupations within the office and administrative support group included office clerks, general (1,850); customer service representatives (1,670); and secretaries and administrative assistants, except legal, medical, and executive (1,450). Among the higher paying jobs in this group were executive secretaries and executive administrative assistants ($29.78) and production, planning, and expediting clerks ($29.50). (See chart 1.) At the lower end of the wage scale were library assistants, clerical ($12.25), and switchboard operators, including answering service ($12.28). (Detailed data for the office and administrative support occupations are presented in table 1; for a complete listing of detailed occupations available go to www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_16620.htm.)

Location quotients allow us to explore the occupational make-up of a metropolitan area by comparing the composition of jobs in an area relative to the national average. (See table 1.) For example, a location quotient of 2.0 indicates that an occupation accounts for twice the share of employment in the area than it does nationally. In the Charleston area, above-average concentrations of employment were found in some of the occupations within the office and administrative group. For instance, postal service mail sorters, processors, and processing machine operators, were employed at 5.3 times the national rate in Charleston, and legal secretaries and administrative assistants, at 4.0 times the U.S. average. Postal service mail carriers had a location quotient of 1.0 in Charleston, indicating that this particular occupation’s local and national employment shares were similar.

The statistics in this release are from the Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) survey, a cooperative effort between BLS and the State Workforce Agencies (SWAs). BLS funds the survey and provides the procedures and technical support. State Workforce Agencies collect most of the data: in this case, the Workforce West Virginia.


Technical Note

The Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) survey is a semiannual survey measuring occupational employment and wage rates for wage and salary workers in nonfarm establishments in the United States. The OEWS data available from BLS include cross-industry occupational employment and wage estimates for the nation; over 580 areas, including states and the District of Columbia, metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs), nonmetropolitan areas, and territories; national industry-specific estimates at the NAICS sector, 3-digit, most 4-digit, and selected 5- and 6-digit industry levels; and national estimates by ownership across all industries and for schools and hospitals. Full OEWS data tables are available online.

Additional information about the OEWS estimates and methodology are available in the national Technical Notes. The overall national response rate for the six panels, based on the 50 states and the District of Columbia, is 65.8 percent based on establishments and 64.3 percent based on weighted sampled employment. The sample in the Charleston, WV Metropolitan Statistical Area included 1,342 establishments with a response rate of 59 percent.

Metropolitan area definitions

The substate area data published in this release reflect the standards and definitions established by the U.S. Office of Management and Budget.

The Charleston, WV Metropolitan Statistical Area includes Boone County, Clay County, and Kanawha County.

For more information

Answers to frequently asked questions about the OEWS data, as well as general program documentation, are available on the OEWS website.

Information in this release will be made available to individuals with sensory impairments upon request. Voice phone: (202) 691-5200; Telecommunications Relay Service: 7-1-1.

Table 1. Employment and wage data for office and administrative support occupations, Charleston metropolitan area, May 2023
Occupation (1) Employment Mean wages ($)
Level (2) Location quotient (3) Hourly Annual (4)

Office and administrative support occupations

14,260 1.1 19.60 40,760

First-line supervisors of office and administrative support workers

1,240 1.2 26.90 55,950

Switchboard operators, including answering service

30 1.1 12.28 25,550

Bill and account collectors

210 1.6 19.71 40,990

Billing and posting clerks

310 1.1 19.52 40,600

Bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks

1,200 1.2 19.50 40,560

Payroll and timekeeping clerks

100 1.0 20.39 42,420

Procurement clerks

130 3.1 19.94 41,480

Tellers

410 1.8 16.12 33,520

Financial clerks, all other

160 5.4 18.54 38,550

Court, municipal, and license clerks

310 2.9 17.53 36,460

Customer service representatives

1,670 0.9 20.01 41,620

File clerks

110 2.0 16.54 34,400

Hotel, motel, and resort desk clerks

180 1.0 12.47 25,940

Interviewers, except eligibility and loan

320 2.9 15.68 32,620

Library assistants, clerical

80 1.5 12.25 25,480

Loan interviewers and clerks

100 0.7 18.09 37,620

New accounts clerks

50 1.7 17.24 35,860

Human resources assistants, except payroll and timekeeping

130 1.9 19.09 39,710

Receptionists and information clerks

790 1.2 14.26 29,660

Information and record clerks, all other

70 0.7 21.55 44,810

Couriers and messengers

100 2.1 14.91 31,020

Public safety telecommunicators

160 2.4 18.57 38,630

Dispatchers, except police, fire, and ambulance

100 0.7 21.67 45,070

Meter readers, utilities

30 2.3 29.46 61,270

Postal service clerks

100 1.9 26.17 54,430

Postal service mail carriers

230 1.0 28.60 59,490

Postal service mail sorters, processors, and processing machine operators

420 5.3 26.55 55,220

Production, planning, and expediting clerks

80 0.3 29.50 61,360

Shipping, receiving, and inventory clerks

270 0.5 19.61 40,790

Executive secretaries and executive administrative assistants

220 0.7 29.78 61,950

Legal secretaries and administrative assistants

410 4.0 20.85 43,360

Medical secretaries and administrative assistants

210 0.4 18.22 37,910

Secretaries and administrative assistants, except legal, medical, and executive

1,450 1.2 18.96 39,430

Data entry keyers

220 2.1 16.95 35,260

Insurance claims and policy processing clerks

340 2.1 18.95 39,420

Mail clerks and mail machine operators, except postal service

100 2.3 15.56 32,370

Office clerks, general

1,850 1.1 16.20 33,700

Office and administrative support workers, all other

70 0.6 20.53 42,690

Footnotes:
(1) For a complete listing of all detailed occupations in the Charleston, WV Metropolitan Statistical Area, see www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_16620.htm.
(2) Estimates for detailed occupations may not sum to the totals due to rounding, and because the totals may include occupations that are not shown separately. Estimates do not include self-employed workers.
(3) The location quotient is the ratio of the area concentration of occupational employment to the national average concentration. A location quotient greater than one indicates the occupation has a higher share of employment than average, and a location quotient less than one indicates the occupation is less prevalent in the area than average.
(4) Annual wages have been calculated by multiplying the hourly mean wage by a 'year-round, full-time' hours figure of 2,080 hours; for those occupations where there is not an hourly mean wage published, the annual wage has been directly calculated from the reported survey data.

 

Last Modified Date: Tuesday, July 23, 2024