Oregon\u2019s labor market has been anemic recently, with the manufacturing, construction and hospitality sectors all struggling.<\/p>\n
But growth was robust in one segment of the economy: Jobs paying more than $60 an hour ($125,000 a year for full-time workers).<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Employment at the top of the wage scale grew by 10% last year, amounting to 36,000 more high-paying jobs, according to a recent analysis<\/a> by Oregon Employment Department economist Molly Hendrickson. That growth was nearly twice as fast as in any other wage category. <\/p>\n Low-paying jobs, meanwhile, declined sharply during 2024. Oregon had 68,000 fewer positions paying under $15 an hour at the end of the year.<\/p>\n Where did all those low-paying jobs go? Most of them turned into higher-paying jobs. <\/p>\n Oregon\u2019s minimum wage rises every year, pegged to inflation. The lowest legal wage varies from region to region across Oregon, based on each community\u2019s cost of living, but the state\u2019s standard minimum wage rose 3.2% last year to $14.70 an hour (it rose again this year, to $15.05.)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Each time the minimum wage goes up, Hendrickson said workers in low-wage categories may move up a notch \u2014 pushing wages up for those above them, too. <\/p>\n That\u2019s good news for workers, as far as it goes. But some low-paying industries, like hospitality, are genuinely shrinking. That can make it hard for Oregonians to find entry-level jobs to start their careers and support their families.<\/p>\n Somewhat counterintuitively, job losses in higher-paying industries don\u2019t necessarily mean lower median wages in those sectors.<\/p>\n Oregon\u2019s construction sector, for example, has been shrinking since 2023. But the job losses were concentrated among lower-paying jobs, so the industry\u2019s median wage increased by 3.3% last year after adjusting for inflation<\/a>. Construction added more than 4,500 jobs paying above $60 an hour.<\/p>\n On balance, Oregon\u2019s growth in high-paying jobs outweighed losses at the bottom of the pay scale. Oregon\u2019s median hourly wage was $24.24 last year (about $50,000 a year for full-time work). That\u2019s a 5.4% increase, nearly double the rate of inflation.<\/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 been anemic recently, with the manufacturing, construction and hospitality sectors all struggling. But growth…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":279714,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[64,420,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-279713","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jobs","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-jobs","10":"tag-united-states","11":"tag-unitedstates","12":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115322137029995054","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279713","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=279713"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279713\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/279714"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=279713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=279713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=279713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}