February 4, 1999 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)
Finance and manufacturing
industries report highest weekly wages in 1997
In 1997, the average weekly wage for all
industries was $584. Of the 970 industries with wage data available at the 4-digit
Standard Industrial Classification level (the most specific level of detail), 38 reported
weekly wages more than twice the average. Manufacturing and finance, insurance, and real
estate industries accounted for almost two-thirds of those industries.
![Specific industries with average weekly wages more than twice the overall average, 1997](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/web/20120925003313im_/http://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/images/1999/Feb/wk1/art04.gif)
[Chart data—TXT]
Finance, insurance, and real estate had 10 specific industries where
average weekly wages were $1,168 or more, including 6 of the 7 industries with the highest
average weekly wages overall. Investment advice ($2,295), security brokers and dealers
($2,267), holding companies not elsewhere classified ($1,931), foreign bank and branches
and agencies ($1,924), investors not elsewhere classified ($1,544), and commodity
contracts brokers and dealers ($1,532) were those six industries. (Sports clubs,
managers, and promoters in the services division ranked fifth at $1,775.)
Manufacturing had 14 specific industries where average weekly wages were $1,168 or
more; the manufacturing industry with the highest average weekly wage—at
$1,354—was electronic computer manufacturing. Rounding out the factory top five were
industrial organic chemicals, not elsewhere classified ($1,305); petroleum refining
($1,289); cigarettes ($1,286); and medicinals and botanicals ($1,278).
These average weekly wage data are a product of the BLS Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (ES-202) program, a virtual
census of establishments, employment, and wages of employees on nonfarm payrolls. Additional information may be obtained from the bulletin, "Employment and Wages
Annual Averages, 1997."
Of interest
Spotlight on Statistics: National Hispanic Heritage Month
In this Spotlight, we take a look at the Hispanic labor force—including labor force participation, employment and unemployment, educational attainment, geographic location, country of birth, earnings, consumer expenditures, time use, workplace injuries, and employment projections.
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Read more »