Where the wage figures come from
Every pay figure on this site comes from one of three places: the Bureau of Labor Statistics, a union local's own published wage sheet, or the federal Davis-Bacon wage determination for the county. Where a figure is our own arithmetic on one of those, the page says so.
Occupation wages: BLS OEWS
National, state and metro electrician pay is the BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics survey, May 2025 edition, occupation 47-2111 (Electricians). Linemen are occupation 49-9051 (Electrical power-line installers and repairers). OEWS counts union and non-union workers together and reports medians, means and percentiles. We use the median as the headline because a few very high earners pull the mean around.
Union rates: wage sheets and Davis-Bacon
An IBEW local's scale is set in its agreement with the contractors. Where a local publishes its wage sheet, we use it. Where it does not, we use the electrician line in the federal Davis-Bacon wage determination for that county, read from the U.S. Department of Labor's data on SAM.gov. Those determinations adopt the local's negotiated rate, and each line carries the date the rate took effect. A local's next contract step can be higher than the determination shows until the Department of Labor updates it, so each page prints the effective date beside the rate.
| Local | Source | Type |
|---|---|---|
| IBEW Local 3 New York City | Local 3 JIBEI wage chart | Local wage sheet |
| IBEW Local 103 Boston | Boston JATC Inside Wage Rate Memorandum | Local wage sheet |
| IBEW Local 46 Seattle | Local 46 area wage report | Local wage sheet |
| IBEW Local 11 Los Angeles | Local 11 inside agreement wage steps | Local agreement |
| IBEW Local 48 Portland | Local 48 wage information | Local wage sheet |
| IBEW Local 98 Philadelphia | PA20260003, classification ELEC0098-003 | Federal Davis-Bacon |
| IBEW Local 134 Chicago | IL20260009, classification ELEC0134-001 | Federal Davis-Bacon |
| IBEW Local 357 Las Vegas | NV20260091, Electrician-Wireman | Federal Davis-Bacon |
| IBEW Local 26 Washington DC | DC20260002, classification ELEC0026-016 | Federal Davis-Bacon |
| IBEW Local 716 Houston | TX20260253, classification ELEC0716-005 | Federal Davis-Bacon |
What we model, and how
- Annual pay from an hourly rate is the hourly rate times 2,080 straight-time hours, with no overtime. Pages say when they use a different hour count.
- Apprentice ladders marked "modelled" apply the typical IBEW inside-wireman progression (40% of the journeyman rate in the first period, rising to 90% in the last) to the sourced journeyman rate. Each JATC sets its own percentages, so a modelled ladder shows the shape, not a published schedule.
- Total package is the base rate plus the fringe figure from the same source. Davis-Bacon gives fringe as one number, so those pages do not split it into health, pension and the other funds.
- Overtime examples multiply a sourced base by 1.5 or 2. Which hours earn which multiple is set by the agreement.
Dates
A data date (for example "BLS OEWS May 2025" or "effective 2 June 2025") is when the figure applies. The "Updated" date on a page is the last time the page itself changed. They are different things and we label them separately.
Corrections
If a figure is wrong or a local has published a newer rate, send the source to the reader-questions address in the footer of every page. We check it against the source and correct the page. See about this site for who publishes it.