Workers in the Nassau-Suffolk Metropolitan Division had an average (mean) hourly wage of $24.92 in May 2011, about 15 percent above the nationwide average of $21.74, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Regional Commissioner Deborah A. Brown noted that, after testing for statistical significance, wages in the local area were significantly higher than their respective national averages in 17 of the 22 major occupational groups, including management, healthcare practitioners and technical, and construction and extraction. No group had an hourly wage significantly lower than its respective national average. (See table A and box note at end of release.)

Table A. Occupational employment and wages by major occupational group, United States and the Nassau-Suffolk Metropolitan Division, and measures of statistical significance, May 2011

Major occupational group	Percent of total employment			Mean hourly wage			Percent difference(1)
	United States	Nassau- Suffolk		United States	Nassau- Suffolk
Total, all occupations	100.00%	100.00%		$21.74	$24.92	*	15
Management	4.8	3.9	*	51.64	62.85	*	22
Business and financial operations	4.8	4.1	*	33.05	37.9	*	15
Computer and mathematical	2.7	1.6	*	37.85	38.48		2
Architecture and engineering	1.8	1.1	*	37.08	37.86		2
Life, physical, and social science	0.8	0.7		32.44	32.52		0
Community and social service	1.5	1.3	*	21.07	25.93	*	23
Legal	0.8	0.9	*	47.3	47.35		0
Education, training, and library	6.6	8.6	*	24.46	31.11	*	27
Arts, design, entertainment, sports, and media	1.3	1.3		25.89	27.21		5
Healthcare practitioners and technical	5.9	6.5		34.97	43.14	*	23
Healthcare support	3.1	3.7	*	13.16	15.41	*	17
Protective service	2.5	2.2	*	20.54	26.52	*	29
Food preparation and serving related	8.7	7.5	*	10.3	11.56	*	12
Building and grounds cleaning and maintenance	3.3	3.9	*	12.29	15.66	*	27
Personal care and service	2.8	3.5	*	11.84	13.01	*	10
Sales and related	10.6	11.3	*	18.04	21.63	*	20
Office and administrative support	16.7	20.4	*	16.4	18.29	*	12
Farming, fishing, and forestry	0.3	(2)	*	11.68	16.84	*	44
Construction and extraction	3.9	4.2	*	21.46	29.16	*	36
Installation, maintenance, and repair	3.9	3.7	*	20.86	23.9	*	15
Production	6.5	4.4	*	16.45	16.99	*	3
Transportation and material moving	6.7	5.3	*	15.96	17.92	*	12
Footnotes: * The percent share of employment or mean hourly wage for this area is significantly different from the national average of all areas at the 90-percent confidence level. (1) A positive percent difference measures how much the mean wage in New York is above the national mean wage, while a negative difference reflects a lower wage. (2) Indicates a value of less than 0.05 percent.

When compared to the nationwide distribution, local employment was more highly concentrated in 8 of the 22 occupational groups, including office and administrative support, education, training, and library, and sales and related. Conversely, 11 groups had employment shares significantly below their national representation, including production, transportation and material moving, and food preparation and serving related.

One occupational group—sales and related—was chosen to illustrate the diversity of data available for any of the 22 major occupational categories. Nassau-Suffolk had 137,010 jobs in sales and related, accounting for 11.3 percent of local area employment, significantly higher than the 10.6-percent share nationally. The average hourly wage for this occupational group locally was $21.63, measurably above the national wage of $18.04.

With employment of 47,340, retail salespersons was the largest occupation within the sales and related group, followed by cashiers (31,910) and sales representatives, wholesale and manufacturing, except technical and scientific products (18,170). Among the higher paying jobs were first-line supervisors of non-retail sales workers and sales representatives, wholesale and manufacturing, technical and scientific products, with mean hourly wages of $54.31 and $51.50, respectively. At the lower end of the wage scale were cashiers ($10.20) and demonstrators and product promoters ($12.12). (Detailed occupational data for sales and related are presented in table 1; for a complete listing of detailed occupations available go to www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_35004.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 Nassau-Suffolk Metropolitan Division, above average concentrations of employment were found in some of the occupations within the sales and related group. For instance, insurance sales agents were employed at 1.7 times the national rate in Nassau, and sales representatives, wholesale and manufacturing, except technical and scientific products, at 1.4 times the U.S. average. On the other hand, cashiers had a location quotient of 1.0 in Nassau, indicating that this particular occupation's local and national employment shares were similar.

These statistics are from the Occupational Employment Statistics (OES) survey, a federal-state cooperative program between BLS and State Workforce Agencies, in this case, the New York State Department of Labor. The OES survey provides estimates of employment and hourly and annual wages for wage and salary workers in 22 major occupational groups and nearly 800 detailed occupations for the nation, states, metropolitan statistical areas, metropolitan divisions, and nonmetropolitan areas.

Technical Note

The Occupational Employment Statistics (OES) survey is a semiannual mail survey measuring occupational employment and wage rates for wage and salary workers in nonfarm establishments in the United States. Guam, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands also are surveyed, but their data are not included in the national estimates. OES estimates are constructed from a sample of about 1.2 million establishments. Forms are mailed to approximately 200,000 establishments in May and November of each year for a 3-year period. The nationwide response rate for the May 2011 survey was 77.3 percent based on establishments and 73.3 percent based on employment. May 2011 estimates are based on responses from six semiannual panels collected over a 3-year period: May 2011, November 2010, May 2010, November 2009, May 2009, and November 2008. The sample in the Nassau-Suffolk Metropolitan Division included 6,579 establishments with a response rate of 77 percent. For more information about OES concepts and methodology, go to www.bls.gov/news.release/ocwage.tn.htm.

The May 2011 OES estimates mark the first set of estimates based in part on data collected using the 2010 Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) system. Nearly all the occupations in this release are 2010 SOC occupations; however, some are not. The May 2012 OES data will reflect the full set of detailed occupations in the 2010 SOC. For a list of all occupations, including 2010 SOC occupations, and how data collected on two structures were combined, see the OES Frequently Asked Questions online at www.bls.gov/oes/oes_ques.htm#Ques41.

Information in this release will be made available to sensory impaired individuals upon request. Voice phone: (202) 691-5200; TDD message referral phone number: 1 (800) 877-8339.

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 Nassau-Suffolk, N.Y. Metropolitan Division includes Nassau and Suffolk Counties.

Table 1. Employment and wage data from the Occupational Employment Statistics survey, by occupation, Nassau-Suffolk Metropolitan Division, May 2011

Occupation(1)	Employment		Mean wages
	Level(2)	Location quotient(3)	Hourly	Annual(4)
Sales and related occupations	137,010	1.1	$21.63	$44,990
First-line supervisors of retail sales workers	9,680	0.9	23.90	49,700
First-line supervisors of non-retail sales workers	2,340	1.1	54.31	112,960
Cashiers	31,910	1.0	10.20	21,210
Counter and rental clerks	1,920	0.5	14.81	30,800
Parts salespersons	1,400	0.7	18.64	38,780
Retail salespersons	47,340	1.2	13.87	28,840
Advertising sales agents	1,290	0.9	34.06	70,830
Insurance sales agents	5,250	1.7	34.08	70,890
Securities, commodities, and financial services sales agents	3,150	1.1	41.54	86,400
Travel agents	950	1.5	19.04	39,610
Sales representatives, services, all other	4,900	0.9	33.56	69,800
Sales representatives, wholesale and manufacturing, technical and scientific products	2,190	0.6	51.50	107,110
Sales representatives, wholesale and manufacturing, except technical and scientific products	18,170	1.4	40.95	85,180
Demonstrators and product promoters	700	1.0	12.12	25,220
Real estate brokers	390	1.1	49.57	103,110
Real estate sales agents	2,030	1.4	39.49	82,130
Sales engineers	540	0.9	45.56	94,770
Telemarketers	1,850	0.8	13.56	28,190
Sales and related workers, all other	760	0.5	20.47	42,580
Footnotes: (1) For a complete listing of all detailed occupations in Nassau-Suffolk, see www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_35004.htm. (2) Estimates for detailed occupations do not sum to the totals because the totals include occupations 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.