Home Project Labor Costs by State (2026)

Median hourly wages for 12 home repair and remodeling trades in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and 20 major U.S. metros (BLS OEWS, May 2025), with a trade labor index and the number of months of household income a typical roof replacement costs in each state (Census ACS 2024). Interactive study, map and charts: https://measuredcost.com/data/home-project-labor-costs-by-state/ Key findings: trade wages are highest in Hawaii (index 140), Alaska (133) and Illinois (131) and lowest in Arkansas (80) and Mississippi (81), U.S. median = 100. A typical roof replacement equals 2.9 months of median household income in West Virginia, against 2.2 nationally and 1.8 in Utah. Among 20 metros, Chicago is 39% above the U.S. median and Tampa 14% below. Files: home-project-labor-costs-by-state-wages.csv (839 rows: 25th percentile, median and 75th percentile hourly wages by trade for the U.S., states and DC, and 20 metros) and home-project-labor-costs-by-state-summary.csv (52 rows: trade labor index, rank, typical roof replacement price, median household income, roof cost in months of income). README.md has the full data dictionary and methodology; datapackage.json is a Frictionless Data Package schema. Method: the index averages state-to-U.S. median wage ratios across the trades BLS publishes for each state, times 100. Roof price is the median of the MeasuredCost roof replacement model (2,000 sq ft one-story home, architectural shingles, one-layer tear-off, permit and contractor overhead and profit included), calibrated against more than 1,400 verified homeowner quotes. Please credit "MeasuredCost analysis of BLS and Census data". Wage data include information from O*NET OnLine by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA), used under the CC BY 4.0 license; MeasuredCost has modified all or some of this information; USDOL/ETA has not approved, endorsed, or tested these modifications.