What's Actually Inside Manufacturing's $30.21 Average Hourly Wage

Manufacturing average hourly earnings, published monthly by the BLS Current Employment Statistics program, stood at $30.21/hour as of Sep 2026, up about 3.4% from a year ago. The figure measures gross straight-time and overtime pay for manufacturing production and nonsupervisory employees, and it excludes benefits, irregular bonuses, and employer payroll taxes. That definition is precise, widely cited, and routinely misused, because the number on the BLS release is not the number a plant actually pays for an hour of labor.

What the number counts, and what it leaves out

BLS series CES3000000008 measures average hourly earnings for production and nonsupervisory employees in U.S. manufacturing. It divides the covered payroll by hours paid for that population. Cash earnings are different from fully loaded employment cost: benefits, employer payroll taxes and other nonwage costs need separate treatment. The all-employees manufacturing series is CES3000000003 and is not the source of the history shown here. This page previously called the stored series all employees; that label has been corrected while preserving the existing source ID, observations and URL. Like other CES estimates, recent observations can be revised.

Manufacturing average hourly earnings, Sep 2026 (BLS CES): $30.21/hour. The archived history runs from $10.52 in Jan 1990 to $30.33 in Aug 2026; the latest reading sits 99% of the way up that range.

Why the definition matters on the shop floor

This average can move because earnings, overtime or the mix of production and nonsupervisory jobs changes. It does not represent every employee on a factory payroll or a particular occupation. The series is up about 3.4% from a year ago; compare that movement with payroll measured for the same population and period. A gap between a local payroll average and the national series is a starting point for investigation, not proof of a pay shortage or surplus.

The BLS wage is a benchmark for direction, not a price for labor. The price is what the number becomes after benefits, taxes, and overtime are loaded on top.

From the BLS wage to a fully loaded rate

To turn the headline figure into a cost you can quote with, apply a burden multiplier. Using a typical factory load of 38% for benefits, employer payroll taxes, and insurance, the $30.21/hour gross wage becomes a fully loaded rate of about $41.69 per hour. Over a standard 2,080-hour year, that is the difference between $62,837 of gross pay and roughly $86,715 of true employment cost per head, a gap wide enough to sink a fixed-price job if a quote is built on the unburdened BLS number.

Put your actual wage, benefits load, and payroll taxes into the direct labor cost calculator to see what an hour on your floor really costs. Compute your loaded labor cost