MSA Wages Explained: What Metro Area Pay Data Means

MSA wages explained: what a metropolitan statistical area is, how BLS reports pay by metro, mean vs. median, limits, and how to use the numbers.

By the Salary Atlas editorial team · Published 2026-10-30

An MSA wage is the typical pay for a job inside a metropolitan statistical area, meaning a city and the commuter region around it, as measured by a federal survey. It is not the pay at a company called MSA. If your search turned up pages about one safety-equipment employer, that is a different topic, and we separate the two below. This guide covers what an MSA is, where the wage numbers come from, how to read mean, median and percentiles, and where the data falls short.

TL;DR

An MSA is a federally defined labor-market area: an urban core of at least 50,000 people plus adjacent counties tied to it by commuting.
Official MSA wage figures come from the BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) program, which covers roughly 530 metropolitan and nonmetropolitan areas.
Use the median and the percentiles, not just the mean, because pay distributions are skewed.
OEWS is a point-in-time snapshot built from three years of surveys, so treat year-over-year comparisons with caution.
Salary pages for a company named MSA are employer estimates, not metro wage statistics.

What an MSA is
Where MSA wage figures come from
What each MSA wage number tells you
How to compare your metro with the national figure
How current MSA wage data is
Limits of MSA wage data
Perspective: why we keep MSA wages plain
Using MSA wages: job seekers, students, advisors and employers
MSA wages versus pay at a company named MSA
Find the numbers behind your own pay question
FAQ
Sources

What an MSA is

MSA stands for metropolitan statistical area. The Bureau of Economic Analysis describes it as one or more counties containing an urban area of at least 50,000 people, plus economically integrated adjacent counties measured mainly through commuting ties. The same document explains that the Office of Management and Budget draws these boundaries and updates them when warranted.

In practice, that means "Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington" is one MSA even though it spans many counties and cities. A worker who lives in a suburb and commutes into the core is counted in the same labor market. That is why wage data uses MSAs instead of city limits: the labor market, not the city line, is what sets the going rate for a nurse or an electrician.

Where MSA wage figures come from

The main source is the BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics survey. Former BLS Commissioner Erica Groshen described it in congressional testimony as a federal survey built to provide detailed wage and employment data for occupations, using standard occupational, industry and metropolitan-area classifications. Because every source uses the same occupation codes and the same MSA definitions, the numbers can be compared across places.

OEWS measures occupational employment and wage rates for wage-and-salary workers in nonfarm establishments. According to the Oklahoma Employment Security Commission's 2024 report, it publishes estimates for approximately 530 metropolitan and nonmetropolitan areas.

Two things follow from that design:

The survey asks employers, not workers. Salary Atlas uses BLS figures only and excludes self-reported or scraped data for the same reason: employer-reported, standardized data is what makes metro comparisons fair.
The survey covers wage-and-salary jobs at nonfarm establishments. Self-employed people, for example, are outside its scope.

For a state-by-state view of the same program, see our guide to finding BLS salary data by job and state.

What each MSA wage number tells you

For each occupation in each area, OEWS publishes more than one number. The dataset includes hourly and annual mean, median, and 10th, 25th, 75th and 90th percentile wages. Here is how to read them.

Figure	What it means	Best used for
Mean	Total wages divided by number of workers	Rough totals, payroll budgeting across a whole workforce
Median (50th percentile)	Half earn less, half earn more	The "typical" worker in the occupation
10th percentile	Only 10% earn less	Entry-level or lowest-paid offers
25th percentile	A quarter earn less	Early-career or smaller-employer pay
75th percentile	A quarter earn more	Experienced workers, strong negotiation targets
90th percentile	Only 10% earn more	Senior specialists and top-paying employers

Mean versus median

The mean gets pulled upward by a small number of very high earners. The Social Security Administration makes the point with national wages: the median is the wage in the middle, and it is substantially less than the average because the distribution is highly skewed. The same logic applies inside a metro.

A Census Bureau Center for Economic Studies report compares mean earnings with the 10th, 25th, 50th, 75th and 90th percentiles at the metropolitan level and shows that the mean alone can hide how earnings are spread across a local labor market. If you are checking whether an offer is fair, start with the median and then see where the offer falls between the 25th and 75th percentiles.

We walk through the calculation in how to calculate the median wage and explain the full ladder in what hourly wage percentiles mean.

A worked example

Suppose a metro reports these annual wages for an occupation: 10th percentile $38,000, median $55,000, 75th percentile $68,000 and mean $59,000. These numbers are illustrative, not real data. The mean sits above the median because high earners lift it. An offer of $52,000 is below the typical worker but well above the bottom tenth, which tells you it is a low-to-mid offer, not a lowball. An offer of $68,000 matches what the top quarter earns, so you would need experience or a specialty to justify asking for it.

Illustrative metro wages and offer on a scale

How to compare your metro with the national figure

Because the classifications are standardized, you can line up the same occupation in two MSAs and against the national estimate. Groshen's testimony notes that standard occupation, industry and metro codes make wage data comparable across sources, while survey design and sampling limit precision. A practical routine:

Pick the exact occupation title, not a similar one. Pay for "software developers" and "web developers" differs a lot.
Pull the median and the 25th and 75th percentiles for your MSA.
Pull the same three numbers nationally.
Compare the gap in the median first, then check whether the spread (75th minus 25th) is wider or narrower locally.
Weigh the gap against local living costs before deciding a higher-paying metro is actually better.

As an example of a national benchmark, our software developer salary page shows the BLS median for that occupation, which you can set against any metro's figure.

Arkansas's occupational-wage publication adds a caution worth remembering: wage differences across areas should be read alongside occupational composition, because an area's overall average reflects both pay within occupations and the mix of occupations present. A metro full of engineers will have a high all-occupations average even if its cashiers are paid the same as elsewhere. Compare one occupation at a time.

If you are weighing a move or a remote job, our explainer on how location-based pay works covers how employers translate metro differences into pay.

How current MSA wage data is

OEWS is not a live feed. It is published annually, and the reference period is May of the survey year. The Department of Labor's Office of Foreign Labor Certification states that for the July 2025 to June 2026 wage year, its figures are based on BLS May 2024 wage estimates. So when you read "current" MSA wages, you are often reading data one to two years old.

Three features of the method matter when you read the numbers:

Pooled samples. California's official guidance explains that OEWS pools employer surveys from the prior three years, adjusts weights, benchmarks to recent employment counts and updates older collection periods using the national Employment Cost Index. A published figure is therefore a blend, not a single-month reading.
Point in time. The same California guidance says the estimates are designed as point-in-time numbers rather than a continual time series, and that BLS does not encourage time-series analysis because methodology, collection and occupational coding changes affect comparability.
Boundary changes. The Labor Department's technical notes say May 2024 estimates use MSA delineations based on the 2020 Census, which produced new areas, compositional or naming changes and discontinued areas. BEA's methodology makes the consequence plain: when definitions change, geographic series can become non-comparable unless the publisher rebuilds the history consistently.

This is why we do not draw trend lines through metro wages from year to year, and why you should be wary of any site that does. For national trend context, read our wage trends for 2026 and how to read wage growth by industry.

Limits of MSA wage data

Groshen's testimony lists several limits that still apply to how the survey is used:

Small samples. In small occupations or small metros, sampling error is larger. Some estimates are suppressed to protect respondent confidentiality or because they are unreliable. If a cell is blank, that is why.
No county estimates. OEWS cannot produce county-level figures, and it does not provide every geographic breakdown users want. If you live in a small county, the MSA or state figure is the closest official proxy.
Establishments, not worksites. Data is collected from business establishments rather than individual job sites, which matters for construction and other work that moves around.

Two more practical limits come from what the data is. Wages are not total compensation, so bonuses, equity and benefits are not in these numbers. And a median describes a group, not you: your experience, certifications and employer size move you up or down the range.

Perspective: why we keep MSA wages plain

We built Salary Atlas around one rule: every figure comes from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and links back to its origin, with no estimates filled in where the data is missing. MSA wages are where that rule is tested most. Small metros have thin samples, boundaries change, and it is tempting to smooth over the gaps with scraped postings or user submissions. We would rather show a missing cell than invent a number.

Our advice follows from that. Treat the median as your anchor and the 25th to 75th percentile range as your realistic negotiating zone. Use the 90th percentile as a ceiling that tells you what top specialists earn, not a promise. Do not read a one-year change in a metro as a trend. And always ask whether a gap between two cities comes from pay for the same job or from a different mix of jobs. The data supports career planning and pay-setting well, but it works best when readers understand what it can and cannot say.

, Joelen Zyoktova

Using MSA wages: job seekers, students, advisors and employers

Washington's employment agency notes that OEWS estimates can be used for career planning, setting wages, and comparing wages by region and occupation. Arkansas's publication adds that metro data can help assess whether relocation may be beneficial for businesses, identify occupational labor availability and compare wages between alternative areas. Here is how that plays out for each reader.

Job seekers

Before a salary conversation, look up your occupation in your MSA. If the offer falls under the median, you have a data-backed reason to ask for more. If you have the experience to justify the upper range, our guide to negotiating with the 75th percentile shows the steps. For context on how posted ranges shape these talks, see what the evidence shows on salary transparency.

Students

Compare the median for the careers you are considering in the metros where you might live, then check the outlook. Our piece on job outlook versus job growth explains why a high-growth field can still pay modestly in a given metro, and the list of fastest growing jobs is a starting point for ideas.

Career advisors and HR teams

Advisors can show clients the full percentile spread instead of one average. HR teams setting pay bands should compare the metro median for each role with the national figure and decide deliberately whether to pay at, above or below the local market. Employers who hire abroad face a different data picture, since other countries publish pay benchmarks in their own formats, such as these South Africa salary benchmarks for remote workers.

MSA wages versus pay at a company named MSA

Search results for this phrase are full of pages about a single safety-equipment employer, with figures such as an average field service technician salary. Those pages are employer-specific pay estimates built from the company's own reported or submitted salaries. They answer "what does that employer pay?" and say nothing about metropolitan wage levels.

Here is a quick way to tell them apart:

Check	Metro wage data (OEWS)	Company salary page
What it covers	All employers in an occupation and metro	One employer
Source	BLS survey of employers	Often user submissions or modeled estimates
Figures shown	Mean, median, percentiles	Usually one average
Geography	A defined MSA	Often the whole country

If the page lists percentiles and names an MSA like "Pittsburgh, PA", it is the former. If it names a company and shows one average, it is the latter. Both can be useful, but you should not compare one against the other as if they measured the same thing.

Find the numbers behind your own pay question

Salary Atlas publishes BLS wage data by job title, percentile and state, with hourly and annual rates, no paywall and no signup. Each figure links to the BLS source, so you can verify it yourself. A good place to start is the BLS salary data by job and state guide, or head to the Salary Atlas home page to look up an occupation.

FAQ

What is an MSA in jobs?

It is a metropolitan statistical area, a federally defined region built around an urban core of at least 50,000 people and the nearby counties closely tied to it by commuting. Job and wage statistics use MSAs to describe local labor markets. The boundaries are set by OMB and updated periodically.

Where do MSA wages come from?

Most come from the BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics program, a survey of employers. It publishes mean, median and percentile wages for each occupation in each metropolitan area. Figures are released annually and reflect pooled data from several years.

Should I use the mean or the median MSA wage?

Use the median for what a typical worker earns. The mean is pulled up by high earners, so it usually runs higher than the median. Use the 25th and 75th percentiles to judge whether an offer is low, fair or strong.

Why is the wage for my occupation missing in my metro?

BLS can suppress an estimate to protect respondent confidentiality or because the sample is too small to be reliable. In that case, look at the nearest larger MSA or the state figure. County-level numbers are not available from this survey.

Can I compare this year's MSA wages with last year's?

Only with care. The estimates are point-in-time snapshots, and changes in methodology, occupation codes and MSA boundaries can make year-to-year comparisons misleading. Compare the same occupation across places in one release instead.