Workers in the Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL Metropolitan Statistical Area had an average (mean) hourly wage of $23.84 in May 2019, about 7 percent below the nationwide average of $25.72, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Regional Commissioner Janet S. Rankin noted that, after testing for statistical significance, 1 of the 22 major occupational groups had an average wage in the local area that was significantly higher than its respective national average. Seventeen groups had significantly lower wages than their respective national averages, including legal; construction and extraction; and arts, design, entertainment, sports, and media.

When compared to the nationwide distribution, local employment was more highly concentrated in 8 of the 22 occupational groups, including office and administrative support; sales and related; and business and financial operations. Nine groups had employment shares significantly below their national representation, including production, transportation and material moving, and educational instruction and library. (See table A and box note at end of release.)

One occupational group—office and administrative support—was chosen to illustrate the diversity of data available for any of the 22 major occupational categories. Tampa had 213,810 jobs in office and administrative support, accounting for 16.0 percent of local area employment, significantly higher than the 13.3-percent share nationally. The local average hourly wage for this occupational group was $18.58, significantly lower than the national wage of $19.73.

Some of the larger detailed occupations within the office and administrative support group included customer service representatives (54,150), general office clerks (27,000), and secretaries and administrative assistants, except legal, medical, and executive (19,200). Among the higher paying jobs were first-line supervisors of office and administrative support workers and executive secretaries and executive administrative assistants, with mean hourly wages of $28.17 and $25.88, respectively. At the lower end of the wage scale were hotel, motel, and resort desk clerks ($11.82) and switchboard operators, including answering service ($12.98). (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_45300.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 Tampa area, above-average concentrations of employment were found in some of the occupations within the office and administrative support group. For instance, customer service representatives were employed at 2.0 times the national rate in Tampa, and file clerks, at 1.7 times the U.S. average. General office clerks had a location quotient of 1.0 in Tampa, indicating that this particular occupation’s local and national employment shares were similar.

These statistics are from the Occupational Employment Statistics (OES) survey, a federal-state cooperative program between BLS and State Workforce Agencies, in this case, the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity.

Technical Note

The Occupational Employment Statistics (OES) survey is a semiannual survey measuring occupational employment and wage rates for wage and salary workers in nonfarm establishments in the United States. The OES 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. OES data are available at www.bls.gov/oes/tables.htm.

The OES survey is a cooperative effort between BLS and the State Workforce Agencies (SWAs). BLS funds the survey and provides the procedures and technical support, while the State Workforce Agencies collect most of the data. OES estimates are constructed from a sample of about 1.1 million establishments. Each year, two semiannual panels of approximately 180,000 to 200,000 sampled establishments are contacted, one panel in May and the other in November. Responses are obtained by mail, Internet or other electronic means, email, telephone, or personal visit. The May 2019 estimates are based on responses from six semiannual panels collected over a 3-year period: May 2019, November 2018, May 2018, November 2017, May 2017, and November 2016. The unweighted sampled employment of 83 million across all six semiannual panels represents approximately 57 percent of total national employment. The overall national response rate for the six panels, based on the 50 states and the District of Columbia, is 71 percent based on establishments and 68 percent based on weighted sampled employment. The sample in the Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL Metropolitan Statistical Area included 5,991 establishments with a response rate of 74 percent. For more information about OES concepts and methodology, go to www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_tec.htm.

A value that is statistically different from another does not necessarily mean that the difference has economic or practical significance. Statistical significance is concerned with the ability to make confident statements about a universe based on a sample. It is entirely possible that a large difference between two values is not significantly different statistically, while a small difference is, since both the size and heterogeneity of the sample affect the relative error of the data being tested.

The May 2019 OES estimates are the first set of OES estimates to be based in part on survey data collected using the 2018 SOC. These estimates use a hybrid of the 2010 and 2018 SOC systems. More information on the hybrid classification system is available at www.bls.gov/oes/soc_2018.htm.

The May 2019 OES estimates are based on the 2017 North American Industry Classification System (NAICS). More information about the 2017 NAICS is available at www.bls.gov/bls/naics.htm.

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 Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL Metropolitan Statistical Area includes Hernando, Hillsborough, Pasco, and Pinellas Counties.

Additional information

Answers to frequently asked questions about the OES data are available at www.bls.gov/oes/oes_ques.htm. Detailed information about the OES program is available at www.bls.gov/oes/oes_doc.htm.

Information in this release will be made available to sensory impaired individuals upon request. Voice phone: (202) 691-5200; Federal Relay Service: (800) 877-8339.

Table 1. Employment and wage data for office and administrative support occupations, Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL Metropolitan Statistical Area, May 2019

Occupation (1)	Employment		Mean wages
	Level (2)	Location quotient (3)	Hourly	Annual (4)
Office and administrative support occupations	213,810	1.2	$18.58	$38,650
First-line supervisors of office and administrative support workers	17,150	1.3	28.17	58,600
Switchboard operators, including answering service	840	1.4	12.98	27,000
Telephone operators	(5)	(5)	16.81	34,970
Bill and account collectors	2,760	1.3	18.33	38,120
Billing and posting clerks	5,130	1.2	18.36	38,190
Bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks	17,340	1.3	20.08	41,770
Payroll and timekeeping clerks	1,360	1.1	21.31	44,320
Procurement clerks	520	0.9	18.58	38,640
Tellers	3,730	0.9	17.89	37,200
Financial clerks, all other	410	1.5	19.26	40,060
Brokerage clerks	560	1.3	22.76	47,350
Court, municipal, and license clerks	810	0.6	19.28	40,090
Credit authorizers, checkers, and clerks	660	2.7	18.61	38,700
Customer service representatives	54,150	2.0	16.85	35,050
Eligibility interviewers, government programs	410	0.3	19.33	40,210
File clerks	1,570	1.7	15.84	32,950
Hotel, motel, and resort desk clerks	2,310	1.0	11.82	24,580
Interviewers, except eligibility and loan	2,040	1.2	16.36	34,030
Library assistants, clerical	350	0.4	13.78	28,660
Loan interviewers and clerks	1,920	1.0	20.98	43,630
New accounts clerks	70	0.2	17.55	36,490
Order clerks	(5)	(5)	17.55	36,500
Human resources assistants, except payroll and timekeeping	1,050	1.0	18.56	38,600
Receptionists and information clerks	11,730	1.2	13.79	28,690
Reservation and transportation ticket agents and travel clerks	1,800	1.6	19.06	39,650
Information and record clerks, all other	1,270	0.9	19.39	40,340
Cargo and freight agents	850	1.0	21.68	45,090
Couriers and messengers	680	1.0	18.17	37,780
Public safety telecommunicators	530	0.6	19.03	39,580
Dispatchers, except police, fire, and ambulance	2,070	1.1	17.17	35,720
Meter readers, utilities	230	0.8	16.59	34,500
Postal service clerks	660	0.9	25.17	52,350
Postal service mail carriers	3,310	1.1	25.17	52,350
Postal service mail sorters, processors, and processing machine operators	870	0.9	25.13	52,280
Production, planning, and expediting clerks	2,600	0.8	22.92	47,660
Shipping, receiving, and inventory clerks	4,840	0.8	16.28	33,850
Weighers, measurers, checkers, and samplers, recordkeeping	270	0.5	18.07	37,590
Executive secretaries and executive administrative assistants	3,780	0.8	25.88	53,820
Legal secretaries and administrative assistants	1,030	0.7	22.69	47,200
Medical secretaries and administrative assistants	4,990	0.9	17.36	36,100
Secretaries and administrative assistants, except legal, medical, and executive	19,200	1.0	17.22	35,820
Data entry keyers	1,890	1.3	15.81	32,880
Word processors and typists	150	0.4	16.30	33,890
Desktop publishers	40	0.5	17.02	35,410
Insurance claims and policy processing clerks	3,130	1.3	18.57	38,630
Mail clerks and mail machine operators, except postal service	660	0.9	14.29	29,730
Office clerks, general	27,000	1.0	17.10	35,570
Office machine operators, except computer	180	0.4	15.35	31,930
Proofreaders and copy markers	40	0.6	17.20	35,790
Office and administrative support workers, all other	2,090	1.2	20.25	42,130
Footnotes: (1) For a complete listing of all detailed occupations in the Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL Metropolitan Statistical Area, see www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_45300.htm. (2) Estimates for detailed occupations do not sum to the totals because the totals include occupations 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. (5) Estimate not released.