{"id":75300,"date":"2025-08-17T15:21:07","date_gmt":"2025-08-17T15:21:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/75300\/"},"modified":"2025-08-17T15:21:07","modified_gmt":"2025-08-17T15:21:07","slug":"heres-what-oregons-major-industries-pay-and-which-have-the-fastest-growing-wages","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/75300\/","title":{"rendered":"Here\u2019s what Oregon\u2019s major industries pay, and which have the fastest-growing wages"},"content":{"rendered":"

Oregon\u2019s labor market has stagnated<\/a>, with major employers shedding jobs<\/a> and the unemployment rate creeping up to its highest level since the pandemic. <\/p>\n

The most recent data from the Oregon Employment Department<\/a> suggests that paychecks have continued to rise, at least through the end of last year, with wage growth generally outpacing inflation.<\/p>\n

Wages are growing much faster in some industries than others, though, and even within certain industries where some jobs pay much better than others.<\/p>\n

Oregon\u2019s median hourly wage was $28.35 in the fourth quarter of last year, according to the employment department. That works out to about $59,000 a year for someone working full time, 40 hours a week.<\/p>\n

Wages grew by about 1.3% overall compared to the same period a year earlier, after adjusting for inflation.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

The biggest wage gains came in the construction sector, where inflation-adjusted wages grew by $1.20 an hour \u2014 a 3.3% increase.<\/p>\n

It might be a little surprising to see construction wages growing even as the industry shrinks. Oregon construction jobs have been in decline since 2023<\/a>, coinciding with a falloff in housing construction. <\/p>\n

\u201cJob growth in an industry does not necessarily lead to wage gains. It is useful to look at job changes by wage category,\u201d said Bingjie Kong, an employment department analyst.<\/p>\n

The construction industry\u2019s job losses last year were concentrated at the low end of the pay scale, Kong noted. But it added more than 4,500 jobs that pay above $60 an hour ($125,000 a year). That pushed the industry\u2019s median wage upwards.<\/p>\n

Wages in Oregon\u2019s health care sector fell last year, despite rapid hiring in the industry. Kong said that again reflects the industry\u2019s changing makeup.<\/p>\n

Oregon added a little more than 15,000 health-care jobs last year but jobs that pay between $20 and $25 an hour accounted for nearly all that growth. Job growth at the top of the wage scale was much slower, so the median wage among all health care workers fell.<\/p>\n

The best-paying sector in the employment department\u2019s broad wage survey is state government, where the median wage was nearly $51 \u2014 80% above the average across all industries.<\/p>\n

That doesn\u2019t actually mean that state workers make far more than their counterparts working similar jobs in the private sector. A 2021 study found state jobs pay about 4% more<\/a>, when factoring in both salaries and benefits.<\/p>\n

The big gap between median wages across all state workers, compared to all industries, reflects the narrower mix of jobs within state government, according to Kong. <\/p>\n

\u201cState government doesn\u2019t tend to have many (if any) jobs like the large, entry-level occupations found in other sectors like leisure and hospitality and retail trade,\u201d Kong said. \u201cAnd those occupations tend to have lower wages \u2013 which changes the wage distribution for the private sector and can make the median stand out differently than it does in government.\u201d<\/p>\n

Data gaps prevented the employment department from measuring growth in state wages during the fourth quarter of last year. But state workers do stand to earn more in the years ahead. <\/p>\n

Earlier this month, the state struck a deal<\/a> with Oregon\u2019s largest public employee unions to grant 6.5% cost-of-living raises over the next two years. Workers at the top of the pay scale will receive additional boosts under the agreement.<\/p>\n

This is Oregon Insight, The Oregonian\u2019s weekly look at the numbers behind the state\u2019s economy. View past installments here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement<\/a> and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and\/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Oregon\u2019s labor market has stagnated, with major employers shedding jobs and the unemployment rate creeping up to its…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":75301,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[64,63,99,180],"class_list":{"0":"post-75300","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jobs","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-business","11":"tag-jobs"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75300","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75300"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75300\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75301"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75300"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75300"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75300"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}