Electrician salary: how much do electricians make? - Housecall Pro
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Electrician salary: how much do electricians make?

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Updated for 2023

Electricians are well worth every dollar they earn! You have a demanding job. Every morning you head out to deal with tight spaces, crazy high voltages of electricity, and the job of ensuring that the customer is always happy.

You want to make the most money for your efforts. And if you own a business that employs electricians, you want to be sure that you’re paying a fair wage while also effectively managing your costs.

But how can you know these numbers? How can you be sure you’re getting paid a fair salary or paying your employees the right amount?

To help you out, we scraped data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics from 2022. We compiled the data, analyzed it, and have broken it all down for you. 

In this post, we’ll take a look at the average salaries for electricians by state to give you a sense of what electricians are being paid throughout the country. We’ll also look at the projected job outlook. What does the future of electrical work look like? (Hint: It’s bright.) Finally, we’ll look at cities within each state with the highest average hourly rate.

Average Hourly Rate For Electricians

The average hourly rate for electricians across the entire United States is $28.87. On an annual basis, this works out to approximately $60,040 per year.

Now, it’s important to remember that this is just an average. These figures include entry-level, mid-level, and senior positions. It also includes the hourly rates of places where the cost of living is much higher, like San Diego, and significantly lower, like small towns in North Carolina.

Taking a closer look, the state with the highest average hourly rate is Hawaii, with an average hourly rate of $42.61, and the lowest average hourly rate is Arkansas, with an average hourly rate of $22.63.

Average Rate By State

When looking at the average hourly rates for electricians, it can also be helpful to zoom in a bit more and view the individual average rates paid by each state.

Again, like we talked about before, these averages include all positions, from the highest paying to the lowest paying.

However, knowing the average hourly rate in each state and then combining it with other data can give you an idea of which states tend to pay more than others.

If you’re on the hunt for a job, this data is particularly helpful. It can give you a sense of where you might want to look for a job as an electrician. And if you own a business that employs electricians, it can also help you know what a fair hourly wage is for your employees.

Electrician Salary Range By State

Going beyond national averages, we can get a sense of what electricians are earning within each state by looking at the range of salaries on a state-by-state basis. This data gives us both a high and low amount that electricians might expect to earn in a state.

Cities With the Highest Electrician Salaries 

In addition to looking at salaries by state, we also wanted to analyze the average salaries within certain cities. This is because each state tends to have a large pay range, with roles in big cities typically offering more than those in smaller towns and communities.

As an electrician, you might not want to compare your salary to the national or state averages. Instead, look at salaries offered within particular cities and compare your salary to those numbers.

Below is a list of the cities with the highest average salary for electricians. Among these cities with 1,000 or more available jobs, Chicago has the highest average salary at $88,990 or $42.79/hour. (And you’d get to enjoy some of the best pizza America has to offer. Invest in a good windbreaker, though.)

Industries With the Highest Levels of Employed Electricians

Some industries offer more opportunities for electricians than others. Here’s a brief overview of the industries with the most employment. 

Building equipment contractors employed 502,930 in 2022. The average hourly rate is $31.16 annually, which works out to $64,800.

Local government—excluding schools and hospitals—pays the highest at $37.07/hour, or $77,100 annually. With only 14,530 of those jobs out there, they’re certainly harder to find!

The Future Outlook and Final Thoughts

Though the above data mostly represents averages, it does provide significant insights into the electrical industry overall. If you’re an electrician, this data is helpful when evaluating your salary and what sorts of pay raises you might expect to see in the future. And if you own a business that employs electricians, this data can help set competitive salaries.

The average salary is approximately $60,040 per year, with many jobs available above that amount. This proves that being an electrician is a well-paying job, and the electrical industry itself is robust and growing. And it doesn’t seem to be stopping anytime soon—now is an excellent time to begin a career as an electrician.

So what does the field look like going forward? In short, pretty awesome. The employment projections reveals a 7% growth for electricians from 2021 to 2031. That adds up to about 79,900 openings for electricians each year. Many of those openings are expected to result from replacing workers who transfer to another career path or retire. Almost every building has electricity. That won’t change any time soon! Alternative power sources like solar and wind may be growing, but should require more electricians for installation. The future is bright! 

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