How much do we earn?

Slightly less than the national average, it turns out

This article was published on 09.16.10

Workers in the Chico Metropolitan Service Area, which includes all of Butte County, had an average hourly wage of $19.05 during May 2009, nearly 9 percent below the national average of $20.90, according to a Bureau of Labor Statistics report released July 28. Wages were significantly higher than their respective national averages in just two of 22 major occupational groups. Here are the wage breakdowns for some of those groups.

Occupational group	% of jobs U.S./Chico	Average hourly wage U.S./Chico
Management	4.7/4.3	$49.47/$40.25
Business & financial operations	4.6/3.0	$31.68/$27.66
Architecture & engineering	1.8/0.9	$35.38/$31.82
Community & social services	1.0/0.7	$20.55/$21.32
Legal	0.8/0.6	$46.07/$35.17
Health-care practitioner and technical	5.5/6.5	$33.51/$35.02
Health-care support	3.0/4.7	$12.84/$12.74
Food prep and serving related	8.6/10.3	$10.04/$9.80
Personal care and service	2.6/3.5	$11.87/$11.05
Office & administrative support	17.1/17.4	$15.86/$15.10
Construction and extraction	4.4/3.9	$20.84/$20.51