Trade earnings and market pressure

An interactive view of where ACS annual $100K trade earners, OEWS wage baselines, and projected openings pressure show up across the country. Pick a trade, toggle states vs metros, and read the numbers honestly — market pressure is a directional signal, not a direct count of vacancies.

Methodology and honest limits

Loading labor-market data

Fetching the three BLS and Census artifacts in parallel.

Before you read too much into this

The default $100K metric uses Census ACS PUMS annual labor earnings (WAGP+SEMP), not just straight-time wage rates.
OEWS trade jobs means the BLS wage-and-salary employment estimate for the selected SOC in that state or metro. It is not total state employment, vacancies, or unmet demand.
The OEWS wage view is kept as a baseline because it is precise by geography, but it can miss overtime-heavy, self-employed, travel, per diem, and owner-income upside.
Market pressure combines projected annual openings per 100 jobs, projected growth, and observed $100K annual-earnings share. It is not a measured labor shortfall.
Bachelor's-holders “competing” is a rhetorical framing. Most of them never try for these jobs, and many trade jobs hire from outside the SOC.
Metro annual-earnings and market-pressure values are projected from state ACS/projection rates applied to metro OEWS employment. Treat metro pressure as lower confidence.