TERRITORY WAGE GAP: BLS Reports USVI Average Hourly Wage Lags More Than Eight Dollars Behind National Average; Tourism Sector Overrepresented
By JOHN McCARTHY / St. Croix Sun News Reporter
CHARLOTTE AMALIE — Fresh economic data released today by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reveals a stark disparity between the earning power of workers in the territory and their counterparts on the U.S. mainland. According to a formal regional report issued by BLS Economist Juliette Smieszek of the Northeast Information Office on Monday, June 15, 2026, the average mean hourly wage for workers across the U.S. Virgin Islands stood at $25.35 in May 2025. By comparison, the national average hourly wage across the United States rested at $33.54, exposing an economic gap of $8.19 per hour for local laborers.
Despite the broader wage deficit, the federal data highlighted several high-performing professional sectors within the local economy that managed to command premium compensation. The highest-paying major occupational groups in the territory were led by the legal profession, which pulled in a top-tier average hourly wage of $47.17. Management occupations followed closely behind, netting local professionals an average of $46.33 per hour, while healthcare practitioners and technical specialists rounded out the top tiers by commanding a mean wage of $43.95 per hour.
The federal report placed a specific spotlight on office and administrative support occupations, which serve as a massive pillar for local employment numbers. These administrative positions accounted for 13.7% of total local area employment in the territory, a footprint that notably outpaces the national industry share of 11.4%. In total, the U.S. Virgin Islands sustained 4,400 distinct jobs within the office and administrative support sector during the data collection period.
The data further underscored the territory's deep institutional reliance on the hospitality and tourism sectors. According to the Bureau's location quotient metrics, hotel, motel, and resort desk clerks were more than four times as prevalent in the U.S. Virgin Islands than they were across the United States as a whole in May 2025.
On a broader macroeconomic scale, federal researchers also noted that total nonfarm payroll employment across the entire territory stood at 32,500 jobs during the month of April. The release comes alongside a wider labor market analysis published in the Monthly Labor Review, which investigated whether shifts in depressive symptoms during and after the global pandemic created adverse employment outcomes for workers between 2019 and 2022. Local residents and business owners can review the full, unedited territory profiles and metropolitan wage metrics directly via the official U.S. Department of Labor data portals.
