Following up our Data Points post from last week – Memphis Metro’s GDP Lags – economist David Ciscel posted data in the post’s comment. However, the data were garbled so we are posting it here.
Compensation Per Job by Metro Area
Wages, Salaries + Employer/Government Benefits
| 2008-16 | |||
| 2008 | 2016 | Growth | |
| US Metro Portion | $58,452 | $68,636 | 17.4% |
| Nashville metro | $52,974 | $63,470 | 19.8% |
| % of national | 90.6% | 92.5% | |
|
Memphis metro |
$52,263 | $60,500 | 15.8% |
| % of national | 89.4% | 88.1% | |
|
Jackson metro |
$44,662 | $51,002 | 14.2% |
| % of national | 76.4% | 74.3% | |
|
Chattanooga metro |
$46,270 | $56,551 | 22.2% |
| % of national | 79.2% | 82.4% | |
|
Knoxville metro |
$47,727 | $57,670 | 20.8% |
| % of national | 81.7% | 84.0% | |
|
Clarksville metro |
$52,903 | $57,226 | 8.2% |
| % of national | 90.5% | 83.4% | |
| Source: US Bureau of Economic Analysis | |||
As always, Memphis is the laggard. This city sucks.
So this indicates Memphis has the lowest paying job wages of every major city in Tennessee? I read it that way. That is really disturbing and not good for the people in this city.
Anonymous searches hard for bad news. This shows that Memphis leads all metro areas in TN but Nashville. Considering the much higher cost of living in Nashville, your $1 stretches further in the M town.
Anon: Good point and we often forget the affordability here. It takes $57,000 in Nashville MSA to live at a level that we can have for $50,000. In particular, housing is 34% higher, transportation is 10% more, and groceries is 6% higher in Nashville MSA.
By the way, Anonymous, these data points were for the entire region, not just for city of Memphis.