Workers in the Lake Havasu City-Kingman, AZ Metropolitan Statistical Area had an average (mean) hourly wage of $26.38 in May 2025, compared to the nationwide average of $33.54, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Regional Commissioner Chris Rosenlund noted that higher paying major occupational groups included management ($47.41), legal ($47.17), and healthcare practitioners and technical ($46.60). Lower paying occupations included personal care and service ($17.87), building and grounds cleaning and maintenance ($17.92), and food preparation and serving related ($18.32). (See table A.)

Occupational groups with the highest employment shares in the Lake Havasu City area included sales and related (12.4 percent), office and administrative support (12.3 percent), and food preparation and serving related (11.4 percent). Major occupational groups on the lower end of local employment included life, physical, and social science (0.4 percent); legal (0.5 percent); and arts, design, entertainment, sports, and media (0.6 percent).

One occupational group—food preparation and serving related—was chosen to illustrate the diversity of data available for any of the 22 major occupational categories. Lake Havasu City had 6,420 jobs in food preparation and serving related, accounting for 11.4 percent of local area employment, compared to the 8.8-percent share nationally. The average hourly wage for this occupational group locally was $18.32, compared to the national wage of $17.86.

Some of the larger detailed occupations within the food preparation and serving related group included fast food and counter workers (1,960), waiters and waitresses (1,190), and restaurant cooks (750). Among the higher paying jobs in this group were chefs and head cooks ($22.89) and bartenders ($22.43). At the lower end of the wage scale were fast food and counter workers ($16.00) and dishwashers ($16.17). (Detailed data for the food preparation and serving related occupations are presented in table 1; for a complete listing of detailed occupations available go to https://data.bls.gov/oes/#/area/0029420/2025.)

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 2.00 indicates that an occupation accounts for twice the share of employment in the area than it does nationally. In the Lake Havasu City area, above-average concentrations of employment were found in some of the occupations within the food preparation and serving related group. For instance, restaurant cooks were employed at 1.46 times the national rate in Lake Havasu City, and waiters and waitresses, at 1.45 times the U.S. average. First-line supervisors of food preparation and serving workers had a location quotient of 1.04 in Lake Havasu City, 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 Arizona Office of Economic Opportunity.

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 530 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 is 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 66.2 percent based on establishments and 67.2 percent based on weighted sampled employment. Sample sizes and response rates by metropolitan and nonmetropolitan area are available on the Additional OEWS data sets page.

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 Lake Havasu City-Kingman, AZ Metropolitan Statistical Area includes Mohave 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.

If you are deaf, hard of hearing, or have a speech disability, please dial 7-1-1 to access telecommunications relay services.

Table 1. Employment and wage data for food preparation and serving related occupations, Lake Havasu City metropolitan area, May 2025

Occupation (1)	Employment		Mean wages ($)
	Level (2)	Location quotient (3)	Hourly	Annual (4)
Food preparation and serving related occupations	6,420	1.29	18.32	38,100
Chefs and head cooks	80	1.11	22.89	47,620
First-line supervisors of food preparation and serving workers	460	1.04	20.46	42,550
Cooks, institution and cafeteria	130	0.80	18.26	37,970
Cooks, restaurant	750	1.46	17.94	37,310
Cooks, short order	80	1.51	18.41	38,290
Food preparation workers	370	1.15	16.93	35,220
Bartenders	380	1.39	22.43	46,650
Fast food and counter workers	1,960	1.40	16.00	33,280
Waiters and waitresses	1,190	1.45	21.67	45,060
Food servers, nonrestaurant	100	0.92	16.65	34,620
Dining room and cafeteria attendants and bartender helpers	200	0.99	17.92	37,270
Dishwashers	200	1.14	16.17	33,630
Hosts and hostesses, restaurant, lounge, and coffee shop	220	1.41	17.72	36,850
Food preparation and serving related workers, all other	30	1.02	19.74	41,050
Footnotes: (1) For a complete listing of all detailed occupations in the Lake Havasu City-Kingman, AZ Metropolitan Statistical Area, see https://data.bls.gov/oes/#/area/0029420/2025. (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.