District of Columbia, Illinois, Oregon, Minnesota and Alaska pay plumbers the highest median wages in the May 2025 BLS data — every one $93,920 or more.
Adjust each state for 2024 cost-of-living price levels and Illinois comes out on top: its $99,950 median is worth $99,992 at national prices.
Here are the highest paying states for plumbers, raw and adjusted, plus the lowest-paying states and whether a move pays.
The highest paying states for plumbers (raw wages)
The May 2025 Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics — the latest edition of the federal survey, released by BLS on May 15, 2026 — put the national median for Plumbers, Pipefitters, and Steamfitters (SOC 47-2152) at $63,800 a year, or $30.67 an hour, across 465,840 wage-and-salary jobs.
Ranked by annual median, the table below is the top of the state list.
Every wage figure in the rankings is a median, and both rankings on this page — raw and adjusted — keep to that one statistic, because the mean, which high earners pull upward, orders the states differently.
| Rank | State | Median annual wage, May 2025 |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | District of Columbia | $101,020 |
| 2 | Illinois | $99,950 |
| 3 | Oregon | $97,050 |
| 4 | Minnesota | $94,410 |
| 5 | Alaska | $93,920 |
| 6 | Massachusetts | $93,880 |
| 7 | Wisconsin | $81,210 |
| 8 | Washington | $81,030 |
| 9 | Michigan | $80,190 |
| 10 | Montana | $79,960 |
| — | United States (median) | $63,800 |
The top of the table carries a job-count caveat: District of Columbia pays the highest median, $101,020, with 1,010 jobs — BLS counts DC as a state.
Alaska is similar, a $93,920 median across 1,200 jobs.
Illinois, at $99,950 with 16,750 jobs, is the largest job market in the top ten; the next-biggest are Michigan (14,120 jobs), Massachusetts (13,460) and Washington (12,470).
Rank the same data by the mean instead and the list changes shape: Oregon leads at $98,450, New Jersey ($92,590) enters the top five, and DC — first by median — falls to fourth at $91,200.
The national mean was $72,170 — $34.70 an hour — above the median for the same reason high earners pull it upward.
One scope note on the word plumber: BLS publishes one combined SOC, 47-2152, whose example titles run from Plumber and Master Plumber to Pipe Fitter, Steamfitter, Sprinkler Fitter and Gas Plumber.
There is no plumber-only BLS wage, so every figure on this page covers the whole trade group.
Most of that trade group works for building equipment contractors — 340,140 of the 465,840 jobs, in the industry sector that also includes electrical contractors — with utility system construction (14,960 jobs) and local government excluding schools and hospitals (11,480) next.
For what plumbers at the 10th and 90th percentiles earn in a specific state, the plumber salary by state tables carry each state's full May 2025 percentile spread.
How to read this ranking
Top-paying states for plumbers, adjusted for cost of living
A dollar buys different amounts in different states, which is why the raw ranking overstates some winners.
BEA's Regional Price Parities put a price level on every state, indexed to the U.S. average of 100: for 2024, the highest were California at 110.7, Hawaii at 110.0 and New Jersey at 108.8 (DC at 109.9), and the lowest were Arkansas at 86.9, Mississippi at 87.0, Iowa at 87.8 and Oklahoma at 87.8.
To see what each median actually buys, we divided every state's BLS median by its BEA 2024 price parity, rebased to the U.S. average of 100.
The result is what that state's median is worth at national price levels.
It is our calculation, not a BLS or BEA statistic, so every adjusted figure below is labeled adjusted for 2024 price levels.
The price levels shown are rounded to one decimal, but the adjusted medians are computed from BEA's unrounded parities — which is why Illinois' $99,950 median adjusts to $99,992 at a printed 100.
| Rank | State | Median, May 2025 | Adjusted for 2024 price levels | Price level (U.S. = 100) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Illinois | $99,950 | $99,992 | 100 |
| 2 | Minnesota | $94,410 | $95,730 | 98.6 |
| 3 | Oregon | $97,050 | $93,894 | 103.4 |
| 4 | District of Columbia | $101,020 | $91,919 | 109.9 |
| 5 | Alaska | $93,920 | $91,755 | 102.4 |
| 6 | Massachusetts | $93,880 | $88,770 | 105.8 |
| 7 | Wisconsin | $81,210 | $86,306 | 94.1 |
| 8 | Montana | $79,960 | $84,484 | 94.6 |
| 9 | Michigan | $80,190 | $83,343 | 96.2 |
| 10 | Indiana | $76,320 | $81,775 | 93.3 |
Illinois is the headline: a $99,950 median at a printed 100 price level adjusts to $99,992, and Minnesota's $94,410 adjusts to $95,730 for second.
The raw leader's median gives up the most: DC's $101,020 shrinks to $91,919 against its 109.9 price level, dropping it to fourth.
The expensive states give it back.
Washington's $81,030 adjusts to $75,720 at a price level of 107, New York's $77,490 to $71,803 at 107.9, New Jersey's $78,240 to $71,908 at 108.8, and California's $72,830 to $65,779 at 110.7.
Hawaii — the second-most-expensive state at 110.0 — pays a $78,060 median that adjusts to $70,995.
Cheap states gain buying power in the adjustment.
Wisconsin's $81,210 median adjusts to $86,306 at 94.1, Montana's $79,960 to $84,484 at 94.6, and Michigan's $80,190 to $83,343 at 96.2.
Indiana ($76,320 raw) never touches the raw top ten, yet its 93.3 price level adjusts it to $81,775.
Mississippi's $55,480 median, near the bottom of the raw table, adjusts to $63,805 at 87.0 — essentially the national median plumber's buying power ($63,800).
Five of the raw top ten price above the national average — DC at 109.9, Washington at 107, Massachusetts at 105.8, Oregon at 103.4 and Alaska at 102.4.
Illinois prints at 100, and the other four price below it: Minnesota at 98.6, Michigan at 96.2, Montana at 94.6 and Wisconsin at 94.1.
Cheap prices alone do not make a top state, though — none of the four cheapest states (Arkansas 86.9, Mississippi 87.0, Iowa 87.8, Oklahoma 87.8) reaches the raw top ten.
What the adjustment is — and is not
The lowest-paying states for plumbers
The bottom of the May 2025 median table: Arkansas at $48,660, South Dakota at $51,620, Idaho at $52,380, Florida at $52,910 and South Carolina at $53,940 — every one well below the $63,800 national median.
Adjust for price levels and the gap narrows without closing: Arkansas adjusts to $55,972 at a price level of 86.9, South Dakota to $58,271 at 88.6, Idaho to $54,852 at 95.5, and South Carolina to $57,537 at 93.7.
All five land at the bottom of the adjusted ranking too — cheap prices do not buy these states up to the adjusted wages of Illinois ($99,992) or Minnesota ($95,730).
Florida is the instructive case.
It employs 29,260 plumber, pipefitter and steamfitter jobs — more than all but two states — at a $52,910 median, and its 103.4 price level adjusts that down to $51,163: the lowest adjusted median in the country, in the third-largest state job market for the trade.
The floor for an individual worker shows up in the percentiles.
Nationally, the 10th percentile for the trade was $21.22 an hour ($44,150 a year) in May 2025, and the 25th percentile $24.13 ($50,190).
Arkansas' $48,660 median falls below that national 25th-percentile line; the other four bottom states sit above it.
One measurement note cuts in the reader's favor: OEWS wages exclude overtime, shift differentials and non-production bonuses, so actual annual earnings for plumbers who work heavy overtime can exceed the published figures.
Union density and plumber pay
There is no BLS union membership rate for plumbers specifically.
The federal union tables publish only broad occupation groups, and our research found no primary source for a union pay premium measured for plumbers, pipefitters or steamfitters as a trade.
What the tables do publish is the group plumbers sit in: construction and extraction occupations.
In 2025, 16.4% of wage-and-salary workers in that group were union members and 17.4% were represented by a union, against 10.0% union membership across all U.S. wage and salary workers.
The earnings comparison the group allows is raw, not controlled: full-time union members in construction and extraction occupations had median weekly earnings of $1,561 in 2025, against $1,004 for non-union workers in the same group.
That is not a plumber-only figure and not a like-for-like pay gap — it compares everyone in the group, in union and non-union shops, across industries.
How union scale is actually set — the local rate sheet, the total package, apprentice percentages — is covered in our guide to union plumber pay.
Should you move for plumber pay?
The very top of the raw table sits in small job markets: the raw leader pays a $101,020 median with 1,010 jobs, and Alaska's $93,920 covers 1,200.
The practical standout on both tables is Illinois: a $99,950 median, $99,992 of adjusted buying power and 16,750 jobs.
Minnesota offers the same arithmetic a size down — $94,410 raw and $95,730 adjusted.
The jobs map and the pay map are different places.
The three largest markets — California (47,660 jobs), Texas (44,090) and Florida (29,260) — pay medians of $72,830, $59,840 and $52,910.
Texas and Florida sit below the $63,800 national median; California is above it raw, but its 110.7 price level adjusts $72,830 down to $65,779.
Metro premiums can outweigh the state line.
The highest-paying metro areas in May 2025 were San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, California ($107,560 median); Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN ($103,380); Bellingham, WA ($102,750); Minneapolis-St.
Paul-Bloomington, MN-WI ($101,630); and Portland-Vancouver-Hillsboro, OR-WA ($101,010).
Chicago's $103,380 sits above Illinois' own $99,950 state median — an intra-state move can be worth as much as a cross-country one.
Compare offers, not just states.
The national median of $63,800 means half of the country's wage-and-salary plumbers, pipefitters and steamfitters earn more than that, and plumber jobs on the board show what is actually open near you now.
The industry route exists but is narrow.
The trade's highest-paying industries in the May 2025 data are small niches, not typical jobs: electric power generation, transmission and distribution ($115,310 median); petroleum and coal products manufacturing ($106,550); and pharmaceutical and medicine manufacturing ($105,800).
The market you would move into is projected to grow.
BLS Employment Projections have the trade's employment changing 6.8% from 2025 to 2035, with about 42,000 openings a year on average against a 3.5% average for all occupations.
The projections include self-employed workers, so their job counts run larger than the 465,840 wage-and-salary jobs in the wage data above.
A move also crosses licence lines, and plumbing licensing is not uniform.
As of September 29, 2026, 23 states and the District of Columbia had a statewide plumber licence with the classic apprentice, journeyman and master ladder; Alaska, New Mexico, Oregon and Washington license at the journeyman level with no state master licence; and in Florida, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New York and Wyoming there is no state plumber licence — cities and counties issue them, or an industry board does.
Illinois, the adjusted-pay leader, has no journeyman rung at all: it licenses apprentices, then licensed plumbers.
Where you stand is decided by the jurisdiction you move to, not the one you leave; start at the plumbing license ladder.
If a permanent move is too much, travel work is the middle path: our guide to traveling plumber jobs covers per diem, project work and how to find them.
Career information, not legal or pay advice. Licence rules come from your state licensing board, or the city and county where licensing is local; wage figures are BLS OEWS May 2025 medians and BEA 2024 price parities. Confirm current rules with the authority that issues them before you plan a move.
Confirm the rules where you would work