Journeyman electrician pay in 2026: what the numbers say

The median electrician in the US made $30.38 an hour ($63,190 a year) in May 2025, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS OEWS). The bottom 10% made under $20.50 and the top 10% made over $52.17. That count includes apprentices and leaves out overtime, per diem and benefits, so a carded journeyman should measure himself against the upper half, not the median.

01What BLS says electricians make (May 2025)

Half of all electricians made between $23.76 and $40.36 an hour in May 2025.

These are the national numbers for occupation 47-2111, Electricians, from the BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics survey. It covers 757,220 wage and salary electricians.

Source: BLS OEWS, May 2025, national data. The mean (average) hourly wage was $34.37. The mean sits above the median because a smaller group at the top pulls it up.

The spread is the real story. The 90th percentile is $31.67 an hour above the 10th (our math). One national electrical contractor told us the band they see runs from "$40 to $45 an hour up to like $80 an hour." Both can be true, because the BLS table mixes apprentices, small towns, residential shops, union locals and data center hands into one list.

02Why the BLS median undersells a journeyman

Three things in how BLS counts push the median below what a carded J-man makes.

Apprentices are in the same count. Under the federal occupation coding rules, "apprentices and trainees are classified with the occupations for which they are being trained" (SOC 2018 User Guide). A first-year apprentice and a 20-year journeyman both land in 47-2111. That pulls the bottom of the table down.

It's straight time only. OEWS wages are "straight-time, gross pay, exclusive of premium pay." Overtime, shift and weekend premiums, holiday pay, and meal and lodging payments are all left out (BLS OEWS FAQ). On a 6-10s job, a big part of your check never shows up in these numbers.

Benefits aren't in it. Health, pension and annuity contributions aren't wages. In a union package they can add $30 or more an hour on top of the rate (see the union section below).

Here's what straight time hides. Say you make $40 an hour on 6-10s. That's 40 hours at $40 ($1,600) plus 20 hours of overtime at $60 ($1,200), or $2,800 a week before per diem. BLS would file you at $40, just under the 75th percentile ($40.36).

03Pay by state

Where you work moves your rate more than anything else on this list.

The top five state medians, May 2025: Oregon $48.71, Illinois $47.87, Hawaii $46.38, Washington $45.78 and Alaska $43.00. The lowest: Arkansas $23.59, Alabama $26.78, North Carolina $27.31, Florida $27.52 and Georgia $28.04.

Source: BLS OEWS, May 2025, state data.

The median electrician in Oregon makes about 2.06 times the median electrician in Arkansas (our math). Cost of living closes part of that gap, not all of it. The full state table, mean vs median and a price-adjusted ranking are in the highest paying states and metros for electricians.

04Pay by metro

Inside a state, the metro matters too.

Source: BLS OEWS, May 2025, metro data. Hourly, straight time.

Look at the 75th column. A top-quarter hand in Phoenix ($37.05) makes less than a median hand in Chicago ($49.21). That's why the national median is a poor yardstick. Use your own metro.

05Union scale, dated

In union-heavy areas, the inside wireman rate sets the top of the local band, and the package on top of it is big.

Sources: wage sheets for Local 46, Local 48, Local 11, Local 440 and Local 340.

Local 48's sheet breaks out where the money goes: $65.50 wage, $11.10 an hour to health, $2.65 to a flex plan, and $19.49 to three retirement plans, for a $98.74 package. Dues come out of that ($2.95 an hour), which leaves $95.79.

Don't line these up against the BLS medians and call the gap a raise you're owed. The union numbers are 2026 journeyman wages. The BLS numbers are May 2025, all experience levels, union and open shop mixed. The full side by side, both ways, is in union vs non-union electrician pay.

06Who signs the check

Electricians who work for government and manufacturers earn higher medians than those who work for electrical contractors or staffing agencies.

Source: BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook, Electricians.

Two notes. Most electricians work for electrical contractors (541,390 of the 757,220 in OEWS, May 2025), so that's the number most hands live with. And the staffing median is the lowest of the four. If you're on an agency's payroll, that's worth knowing.

Plant, utility, residential and commercial lanes each pay differently; the details are in commercial vs residential vs industrial electrician pay.

07The rate isn't the whole check

The number to compare is the weekly check over the length of the job, not the hourly rate.

A live ad on a travel job board, posted Oct 19, 2026, shows how fast it adds up. A power plant job in Utah lists $55 an hour for licensed journeymen, 6-10s, about a year of work, and $190 a day per diem for hands who live 60 miles or more away.

Our math on that ad, as an example:

• 40 straight hours x $55 = $2,200
• 20 overtime hours x $82.50 = $1,650
• Per diem, if it pays all 6 days worked: 6 x $190 = $1,140
• Week: $4,990, of which $3,850 is wages

Federal overtime is time and a half after 40 hours in a workweek (DOL Fact Sheet #23). How the per diem pays (days worked or 7 days) changes the week by hundreds. The math for a road job against a home job is in travel vs local electrician pay.

08Is pay going up?

Yes. Construction pay is rising faster than pay in the rest of the private sector.

In August 2026, production and nonsupervisory construction workers averaged $39.36 an hour, up 5.0% from a year earlier, while private-sector production workers overall gained 3.3% (AGC, Sept 4, 2026). In the AGC and NCCER 2026 workforce survey, more than 8 in 10 firms reported raising base pay for hourly craft and salaried workers as much as or more than the year before (AGC, Sept 3, 2026).

Those numbers cover all construction trades, not just electricians, and come from a different survey than OEWS, so don't stack them on the BLS table. Use them for one thing: if your rate hasn't moved in a year, the market moved without you. One national electrical contractor told us they'd been "going higher and higher on the pay rate so we can be competitive." That's the same story from the shop's side.

09Two bumps that move the rate

Running work and a higher license are the two raises you can earn without changing towns.

On union sheets, a foreman makes 10% to 15% over the journeyman rate and a general foreman 20% to 30%. Local 46 pays a foreperson $85.72 and a general foreperson $93.52 against $77.93 for a journeyman. More in how much an electrical foreman makes.

A master license is a different call. It matters most when you pull permits or want to run a shop. Whether it pays on the tools is covered in whether a master license is worth it on the tools.

10Where you sit

Put your straight-time rate on your metro's ladder, not the national one, and you'll know where you stand in about five minutes.

1. Look up your metro on the BLS OEWS tables (occupation 47-2111). Write down the 25th, median and 75th.
2. If you have your card and 5 or more years in, the median is your floor for the conversation. The apprentices in the count are below you.
3. Under the 25th with a card is a red flag. Run through the signs you're underpaid before you do anything else.
4. Near the 75th or above, the rate is fine. Look at hours, per diem and how long the work lasts instead.
5. If you're under, start where you are. How to ask for a raise as a journeyman walks through the numbers to bring.

Two journeymen in the same metro can be $15 apart for real reasons: union or open shop, plant or contractor, service or construction, OT or none. Know which of those you are before you compare.

Run your Pay Check to see what electricians with your license make near you. Takes about a minute and your boss never hears about it.

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