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News Release Information

25-762-SAN
Thursday, May 15, 2025

Contacts Technical information: Media contact:
  • (415) 625-2270

Occupational Employment and Wages in Salem — May 2024

Workers in the Salem, OR Metropolitan Statistical Area had an average (mean) hourly wage of $31.52 in May 2024, compared to the nationwide average of $32.66, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Regional Commissioner Chris Rosenlund noted that higher paying major occupational groups included management ($59.11), healthcare practitioners and technical ($58.57), and legal ($56.34). Lower paying occupations included food preparation and serving related ($18.48), personal care and service ($19.17), and building and grounds cleaning and maintenance ($20.42). (See table A.)

Occupational groups with the highest employment in the Salem area included office and administrative support (12.0 percent), transportation and material moving (8.7 percent), and food preparation and serving related (8.2 percent). Major occupational groups on the lower end of local employment included legal (0.9 percent); arts, design, entertainment, sports, and media (1.0 percent); and life, physical, and social science (1.0 percent).

Table A. Occupational employment and wages by major occupational group, United States and the Salem metropolitan area, May 2024
Major occupational group Percent of total employment Mean hourly wage ($)
United States Salem United States Salem

Total, all occupations

100.0 100.0 32.66 31.52

Management

7.1 5.9 68.15 59.11

Business and financial operations

6.7 8.1 45.04 42.21

Computer and mathematical

3.4 2.7 56.16 48.91

Architecture and engineering

1.7 1.1 49.99 48.22

Life, physical, and social science

0.9 1.0 43.12 40.92

Community and social service

1.7 2.7 30.31 31.49

Legal

0.8 0.9 66.19 56.34

Educational instruction and library

5.8 5.8 31.69 31.56

Arts, design, entertainment, sports, and media

1.4 1.0 37.04 33.32

Healthcare practitioners and technical

6.2 5.9 50.59 58.57

Healthcare support

4.8 5.7 19.06 22.66

Protective service

2.4 2.2 29.33 32.76

Food preparation and serving related

8.8 8.2 17.32 18.48

Building and grounds cleaning and maintenance

2.9 3.0 19.01 20.42

Personal care and service

2.0 3.3 18.95 19.17

Sales and related

8.7 7.1 26.00 23.17

Office and administrative support

11.8 12.0 24.12 25.22

Farming, fishing, and forestry

0.3 1.7 20.06 18.07

Construction and extraction

4.1 5.4 30.73 31.41

Installation, maintenance, and repair

3.9 3.3 29.63 29.89

Production

5.7 4.1 24.08 22.75

Transportation and material moving

8.9 8.7 23.44 22.47

One occupational group—office and administrative support—was chosen to illustrate the diversity of data available for any of the 22 major occupational categories. Salem had 22,450 jobs in office and administrative support, accounting for 12.0 percent of local area employment, compared to the 11.8-percent share nationally. The average hourly wage for this occupational group locally was $25.22, compared to the national wage of $24.12.

Some of the larger detailed occupations within the office and administrative support group included general office clerks (3,420), secretaries and administrative assistants, except legal, medical, and executive (3,090), and customer service representatives (2,240). Among the higher paying jobs in this group were public safety telecommunicators ($35.72) and executive secretaries and executive administrative assistants ($34.94). At the lower end of the wage scale were hotel, motel, and resort desk clerks ($18.15) and clerical library assistants ($18.29). (Detailed data for the office and administrative support occupations are presented in table 1; for a complete listing of detailed occupations available go to https://data.bls.gov/oes/#/area/0041420.)

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 Salem area, above-average concentrations of employment were found in some of the occupations within the office and administrative support group. For instance, executive secretaries and executive administrative assistants were employed at 1.69 times the national rate in Salem, and payroll and timekeeping clerks, at 1.50 times the U.S. average. Shipping, receiving, and inventory clerks had a location quotient of 1.00 in Salem, 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 Oregon Employment Department.

Changes to the Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) Data

Effective with the May 2024 OEWS news release, the OEWS program has implemented new metropolitan area definitions based on the 2020 decennial census and delineated by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), Bulletin 23-01. This news release does not include data for Colorado and its areas because of quality concerns with Colorado’s Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW) data. See the national OEWS news release for more information.


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 65.7 percent based on establishments and 65.9 percent based on weighted sampled employment. The sample in the Salem, OR Metropolitan Statistical Area included 1,878 establishments with a response rate of 62 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 Salem, OR Metropolitan Statistical Area includes Marion County and Polk 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, Salem metropolitan area, May 2024
Occupation (1) Employment Mean wages ($)
Level (2) Location quotient (3) Hourly Annual (4)

Office and administrative support occupations

22,450 1.02 25.22 52,450

First-line supervisors of office and administrative support workers

1,390 0.77 34.43 71,610

Switchboard operators, including answering service

30 0.69 21.73 45,200

Bill and account collectors

40 0.19 26.90 55,950

Billing and posting clerks

570 1.14 25.58 53,200

Bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks

2,230 1.27 26.35 54,810

Payroll and timekeeping clerks

290 1.50 28.42 59,110

Procurement clerks

70 1.01 26.31 54,720

Tellers

270 0.66 20.35 42,340

Court, municipal, and license clerks

210 1.01 28.29 58,850

Customer service representatives

2,240 0.68 22.72 47,250

Eligibility interviewers, government programs

210 1.12 23.99 49,890

File clerks

160 1.63 22.31 46,410

Hotel, motel, and resort desk clerks

180 0.57 18.15 37,740

Interviewers, except eligibility and loan

200 1.05 24.55 51,060

Library assistants, clerical

40 0.42 18.29 38,040

Loan interviewers and clerks

100 0.47 26.06 54,210

New accounts clerks

80 1.70 24.55 51,060

Order clerks

80 0.78 22.66 47,130

Human resources assistants, except payroll and timekeeping

120 1.05 23.37 48,610

Receptionists and information clerks

1,300 1.12 19.29 40,130

Information and record clerks, all other

560 3.21 21.69 45,120

Cargo and freight agents

50 0.42 25.15 52,320

Couriers and messengers

60 0.70 20.19 41,980

Public safety telecommunicators

150 1.21 35.72 74,300

Dispatchers, except police, fire, and ambulance

280 1.08 25.23 52,470

Postal service clerks

80 0.83 30.61 63,670

Postal service mail carriers

320 0.78 28.32 58,910

Postal service mail sorters, processors, and processing machine operators

30 0.23 30.09 62,600

Production, planning, and expediting clerks

190 0.41 27.57 57,340

Shipping, receiving, and inventory clerks

1,030 1.00 22.83 47,480

Weighers, measurers, checkers, and samplers, recordkeeping

50 0.75 20.77 43,200

Executive secretaries and executive administrative assistants

960 1.69 34.94 72,680

Legal secretaries and administrative assistants

210 1.14 26.59 55,310

Medical secretaries and administrative assistants

1,270 1.26 24.35 50,650

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

3,090 1.47 25.45 52,940

Data entry keyers

120 0.74 22.04 45,830

Insurance claims and policy processing clerks

180 0.67 25.63 53,310

Mail clerks and mail machine operators, except postal service

80 1.02 21.28 44,260

Office clerks, general

3,420 1.13 23.22 48,300

Office machine operators, except computer

40 1.34 22.43 46,650

Office and administrative support workers, all other

350 1.48 24.74 51,460

Footnotes:
(1) For a complete listing of all detailed occupations in the Salem, OR Metropolitan Statistical Area, see https://data.bls.gov/oes/#/area/0041420.
(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: Thursday, May 15, 2025