Workers in the Eau Claire, WI Metropolitan Statistical Area had an average (mean) hourly wage of $25.74 in May 2022, 14 percent below the nationwide average of $29.76, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Regional Commissioner Jason Palmer noted that, after testing for statistical significance, wages in the local area were lower than their respective national averages in 20 of the 22 major occupational groups, including legal; computer and mathematical; and arts, design, entertainment, sports, and media. Two groups, including healthcare practitioners and technical, had significantly higher wages than their respective national averages.

When compared to the nationwide distribution, Eau Claire area employment was more highly concentrated in 8 of the 22 occupational groups, including production, healthcare practitioners and technical, and transportation and material moving. Thirteen groups had employment shares significantly below their national representation, including management, business and financial operations, and computer and mathematical. (See table A.)

One occupational group—production—was chosen to illustrate the diversity of data available for any of the 22 major occupational categories. Eau Claire had 7,560 jobs in production, accounting for 9.1 percent of local area employment, significantly higher than the 5.9-percent share nationally. The average hourly wage for this occupational group locally was $21.06, significantly below the national wage of $21.81.

Some of the larger detailed occupations within the production group included miscellaneous assemblers and fabricators (940), packaging and filling machine operators and tenders (680), and first-line supervisors of production and operating workers (620). Among the higher-paying jobs in this group were first-line supervisors of production and operating workers and computer numerically controlled tool programmers, with mean hourly wages of $30.74 and $30.03, respectively. At the lower end of the wage scale were laundry and dry-cleaning workers ($14.86) and sewing machine operators ($15.69). (Detailed data for the production occupations are presented in table 1; for a complete listing of detailed occupations available go to www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_20740.htm.)

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 2.0 indicates that an occupation accounts for twice the share of employment in the area than it does nationally. In the Eau Claire area, above-average concentrations of employment were found in many of the occupations within the production group. For instance, paper goods machine setters, operators, and tenders were employed at 4.4 times the national rate in Eau Claire, and food batchmakers, at 3.9 times the U.S. average. Miscellaneous assemblers and fabricators had a location quotient of 1.2 in Eau Claire, indicating that this particular occupation’s local and national employment shares were similar.

These statistics are from the Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) survey, a federal-state cooperative program between BLS and State Workforce Agencies, in this case, the Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development.

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 580 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. OEWS data are available at www.bls.gov/oes/tables.htm.

The OEWS survey is a cooperative effort between BLS and the State Workforce Agencies (SWAs). BLS funds the survey and provides the procedures and technical support, while the State Workforce Agencies collect most of the data. OEWS estimates are constructed from a sample of about 1.1 million establishments. Each year, two semiannual panels of approximately 179,000 to 187,000 sampled establishments are contacted, one panel in May and the other in November. Responses are obtained by Internet or other electronic means, mail, email, telephone, or personal visit. The May 2022 estimates are based on responses from six semiannual panels collected over a 3-year period: May 2022, November 2021, May 2021, November 2020, May 2020, and November 2019. The unweighted sampled employment of 80 million across all six semiannual panels represents approximately 57 percent of total national employment. The overall national response rate for the six panels, based on the 50 states and the District of Columbia, is 65.4 percent based on establishments and 62.5 percent based on weighted sampled employment. The sample in the Eau Claire, WI Metropolitan Statistical Area included 1,191 establishments with a response rate of 72 percent. For more information about OEWS concepts and methodology, go to www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_tec.htm.

A value that is statistically different from another does not necessarily mean that the difference has economic or practical significance. Statistical significance is concerned with the ability to make confident statements about a universe based on a sample. It is entirely possible that a large difference between two values is not significantly different statistically, while a small difference is, since both the size and heterogeneity of the sample affect the relative error of the data being tested.

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 Eau Claire, WI Metropolitan Statistical Area includes Chippewa County and Eau Claire County.

For more information

Answers to frequently asked questions about the OEWS data are available at www.bls.gov/oes/oes_ques.htm. Detailed information about the OEWS program is available at www.bls.gov/oes/oes_doc.htm.

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 production occupations, Eau Claire metropolitan area, May 2022

Occupation (1)	Employment		Mean wages
	Level (2)	Location quotient (3)	Hourly	Annual (4)
Production occupations	7,560	1.6	$21.06	$43,800
First-line supervisors of production and operating workers	620	1.7	30.74	63,930
Electrical, electronic, and electromechanical assemblers, except coil winders, tapers, and finishers	570	3.7	18.78	39,070
Structural metal fabricators and fitters	60	1.9	23.01	47,860
Miscellaneous assemblers and fabricators	940	1.2	17.25	35,880
Bakers	80	0.7	16.09	33,480
Butchers and meat cutters	90	1.3	17.72	36,860
Food batchmakers	360	3.9	21.35	44,410
Extruding and drawing machine setters, operators, and tenders, metal and plastic	100	2.9	19.74	41,060
Cutting, punching, and press machine setters, operators, and tenders, metal and plastic	200	2.0	18.91	39,330
Grinding, lapping, polishing, and buffing machine tool setters, operators, and tenders, metal and plastic	90	2.2	20.96	43,590
Machinists	140	0.8	22.22	46,230
Molding, coremaking, and casting machine setters, operators, and tenders, metal and plastic	250	2.7	19.58	40,720
Multiple machine tool setters, operators, and tenders, metal and plastic	130	1.7	(5)	(5)
Tool and die makers	70	2.0	27.49	57,170
Welders, cutters, solderers, and brazers	290	1.3	22.81	47,440
Printing press operators	110	1.4	20.42	42,460
Print binding and finishing workers	40	1.8	16.54	34,410
Laundry and dry-cleaning workers	100	1.0	14.86	30,910
Sewing machine operators	60	0.9	15.69	32,640
Cabinetmakers and bench carpenters	50	1.0	21.08	43,840
Sawing machine setters, operators, and tenders, wood	40	1.5	18.52	38,510
Woodworking machine setters, operators, and tenders, except sawing	100	2.7	19.34	40,230
Water and wastewater treatment plant and system operators	70	1.1	26.44	55,000
Mixing and blending machine setters, operators, and tenders	40	0.6	22.61	47,030
Cutting and slicing machine setters, operators, and tenders	50	1.8	21.82	45,380
Inspectors, testers, sorters, samplers, and weighers	490	1.5	20.32	42,270
Dental laboratory technicians	30	1.8	19.13	39,790
Packaging and filling machine operators and tenders	680	3.3	19.30	40,140
Coating, painting, and spraying machine setters, operators, and tenders	130	1.5	19.82	41,220
Computer numerically controlled tool operators	340	3.4	25.39	52,810
Computer numerically controlled tool programmers	40	2.6	30.03	62,460
Molders, shapers, and casters, except metal and plastic	70	3.4	18.83	39,160
Paper goods machine setters, operators, and tenders	230	4.4	24.64	51,260
Helpers--production workers	120	1.2	20.30	42,230
Production workers, all other	170	1.2	17.77	36,960
Footnotes: (1) For a complete listing of all detailed occupations in the Eau Claire, WI Metropolitan Statistical Area, see www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_20740.htm. (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. (5) Estimate not released.