By John Byczkowski
Enquirer staff writer

Wages in Cincinnati continue to be "average or the low side of average," according to a new survey from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The survey shows hourly wages for full-time jobs in the private sector were $19.48 in October 2003, virtually unchanged from the year before. The survey considers wages only, and not benefits or bonuses.

Ron Guzicki, an economist with the bureau, said, "Cincinnati is average or the low side of average" in wage rates. White-collar jobs pay less here than in Boston, Chicago and even Milwaukee, he said.

Blue-collar occupations in Cincinnati pay wages more comparable to the rest of the nation, because of a concentration of high-skilled manufacturing jobs, Guzicki said. Precision production supervisors and mechanics make $27.24 an hour.

Cincinnati pays a price for average wages. It might be less attractive as a place to work and live, said George Vredeveld, an economist at the University of Cincinnati. "People move to improve themselves, and in many cases it's to improve their compensation," he said.

People migrate around the country to be close to relatives or to earn more money, he said. The fact that Cincinnati's wages are average would be "a negative as far as attracting people to this area," he said.

That Cincinnati is average shouldn't be a surprise, said Susan Haberman, a principal with Mercer Human Resources Consulting in Chicago. Cincinnati's cost of living isn't high compared to cities such as Chicago, New York or San Francisco, "so it's not surprising that you're somewhat conservative in your pay increase trends," she said.

"Employees make a lot of different decisions when they're selecting a job," she said. "They're choosing based upon geography, they're choosing based upon quality and standard of living, they're choosing based upon the types of rewards in terms of pay benefits and careers offered by a company."

Haberman said pay increases averaged 3.3 percent in 2003, will average 3.3 percent again next year, and will increase 3.6 percent in 2005, and those increases are fairly consistent across the country.

The highest paying jobs in Cincinnati are executives and engineers, according to the survey. Executives, administrators and managers earn $38.66 an hour in the private sector, the survey said. Industrial engineers earn $34.57, while mathematical and computer scientists earn $35.81.

The survey publishes wage rates for occupations only where enough data is available. The 2002 survey, for instance, contained information for physicians and airline pilots, but those occupations are absent from the 2003 survey.

Guzicki said about 29 percent of employers surveyed in Greater Cincinnati in 2003 did not respond, on the high side of what he's seen around the Midwest. A high level of non-response limits the number of occupations for which data are available.

Results of the survey are available on the bureau's Web site at www.bls.gov/ncs/ocs/compub.htm.

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E-mail johnb@enquirer.com

How wages compare

How Cincinnati compared to other U.S. cities in hourly wages paid for full-time, private sector jobs in 2003.

City	White collar*	Blue collar	Service
Cincinnati	$25.07	$16.54	$10.58
Austin, Texas	$23.96	$12.35	$9.51
Boston	$28.50	$18.30	$12.38
Buffalo, N.Y.	$21.97	$17.53	$9.94
Charlotte, N.C.	$24.04	$15.29	$11.47
Chicago	$26.31	$16.77	$10.25
Denver	$25.37	$15.58	$11.15
Greenville, S.C.	$22.33	$14.25	$8.25
Kansas City	$22.84	$17.83	$11.07
Louisville	$18.79	$15.45	$9.60
Milwaukee	$25.96	$17.34	$11.07
Minneapolis	$25.97	$18.40	$10.83
Phoenix	$24.65	$14.16	$9.98
Portland, Ore.	$24.34	$16.24	$10.95
San Antonio	$19.52	$13.82	$7.87
Tampa/St. Petersburg, Fla.	$22.37	$12.44	$8.33
Washington, D.C./Baltimore	$26.69	$17.13	$10.65

* Does not include sales.

Service includes protection service such as police and firemen, food service, health service such as nurses aides (but not doctors and nurses), cleaning service and personal service.