Bay Area workers entered the early stages of the coronavirus outbreak with some of the highest wages in the nation, and in the case of South Bay, the highest wages, a new federal report shows.
Average weekly wages in Santa Clara County for the last three months of 2019 were the best in the nation, a report by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics shows.
Nationwide, the three counties with the highest average weekly wages were located in the Bay Area: Santa Clara, San Mateo, and San Francisco counties.
The first five places are completed by number 4, New York County, which contains Manhattan; and No. 5, Suffolk County in Massachusetts, whose main city is Boston. Those five are all technology hubs, as this news organization’s assessment of federal statistics shows. Also in the top 10 is King County, a community in Washington state that contains Seattle.
“Somehow, high wages would have helped the Bay Area economy against coronavirus,” said Mark Vitner, senior economist at Wells Fargo Bank. “The Bay Area had a huge boost for COVID 19.”
The statistics were contained in the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages, or QCEW report, compiled by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The average weekly salary for Santa Clara County in the fourth quarter of 2019 was $ 2,825, the report determined. South Bay wages were 138 percent higher than the national average weekly wage of $ 1,185, or more than double.
South Bay wages were also 94 percent higher, or nearly double, the California average, which was $ 1,457 in the last three months of 2019, the survey found.
San Mateo County recorded an average weekly salary of $ 2,622, while San Francisco County earned an average of $ 2,523 during the October to December 2019 quarter.
“Many technology companies were struggling to find workers before the coronavirus arrived, so wages increased,” Vitner said. “Despite technology holding up relatively well, in this environment, wages could soften.”
New York County posted an average weekly salary of $ 2,502, while the Boston area of Suffolk County achieved a weekly salary of $ 2,146 in the fourth quarter.
In East Bay, the average weekly salary was $ 1,577 in Alameda County and $ 1,415 in Contra Costa County.
In North Bay, average wages in the fourth quarter were $ 1,499 in Marin County, $ 1,201 in Sonoma County, $ 1,200 in Solano County, and $ 1,188 in Napa County, the Bureau of Statistics reported. Labor.
Weekly wages in all nine Bay Area counties were above the national average.
Six of the nine counties in the Bay Area were above the state median wage. Only Napa County, Solano County, and Sonoma County were below the California average wage, the federal report determined.
Coronavirus-linked business closings ordered by state and local government agencies have affected the job market in the Bay Area, California and across the country.
The Bay Area posted huge job gains in May and June, immediately after huge job losses in March and April. Despite recent progress, the Bay Area has a long way to go before recovering the jobs it lost during the worst months of the coronavirus closings.
“No area has emerged unscathed,” said Vitner. “But it is good to know that the Bay Area had a very strong momentum as it entered the coronavirus crisis.”
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