Best States 2021: 10 States With The Lowest Tech Salaries (And 10 With The Highest)
For solution providers looking to hire low-cost tech talent, here’s a look at the 10 states that have the lowest average annual salary for tech workers – and the 10 states where tech workers come with the biggest price tags.
What It Costs To Hire A Tech Worker
As solution providers and strategic service providers ramp up business as the economy recovers from the 2020 downturn, finding and hiring tech talent to fill tech positions in development, sales engineering, customer support, and systems installation and maintenance is one of their biggest challenges. And a big part of that is finding qualified tech workers at affordable salaries.
As part of the 2021 Best States project, we take a look at the average salaries for tech workers in each of the 50 states, offering solution providers information they can use in making tech worker hiring decisions.
While some solution providers may prefer to hire tech employees to work in company offices – especially solution providers focused on specific geographic regions – the COVID-19 pandemic has shown that a distributed workforce with work-from-home employees can be productive. And increased use of cloud-based IT systems, by both solution providers and their customers, is enabling that trend.
Solution providers in high-cost states like Massachusetts and Washington, in interviews with CRN, said hiring tech workers in states with lower salaries is an increasingly feasible option. (There are even signs that increased hiring of remote workers is starting to push up salaries in low-wage states.)
Here we provide a ranking of the 10 states with the lowest average tech salaries, leading up to No. 1 – the state with the lowest average tech salary. We then list the 10 states with the highest average tech salaries.
(Keep in mind that this ranking is for solution providers looking to hire low-cost tech workers, so the No. 1 state has the lowest average annual salary while the state with the highest salary is No. 50. Tech workers looking for states where salaries are highest will, of course, see this list very differently: For them, the states ranked lowest are most beneficial because they pay the highest salaries.)
(Also keep in mind that the states with the lowest salaries are often far from the nation’s tech hubs and so may have downsides such as smaller pools of tech talent and lower levels of tech worker education and experience.)
The ranking is based on salary data from Visual Capitalist, which in August published the average salary for tech workers in each state. Visual Capitalist also calculated the average hourly wage for tech workers in each state.
To help solution providers gauge the relative size of the tech talent pool in each state, we’ve included statistics from the CompTIA Cyberstates 2021 report on tech jobs as a percent of each state’s total workforce.
This slide show is part of CRN’s 2021 Best States project that includes the Best States: The Challenge Of Finding Tech Talent In 2021 article, the state-by state ranking for finding tech talent, and a wide range of data about tech worker education, salaries and other statistics.
No. 10: Oklahoma
Average Tech Worker Salary: $75,560
The average hourly wage for tech workers in Oklahoma is $36.33.
Tech jobs account for 8.9 percent of the total workforce in the Sooner State.
No. 9: Kentucky
Average Tech Worker Salary: $75,330
The average hourly wage for tech workers in Kentucky is $36.21.
Tech jobs account for 14.3 percent of the total workforce in the Bluegrass State.
No. 8: Louisiana
Average Tech Worker Salary: $73,840
The average hourly wage for tech workers in Louisiana is $35.50.
Tech jobs account for 12.6 percent of the total workforce in the Pelican State.
No. 7: West Virginia
Average Tech Worker Salary: $73,410
The average hourly wage for tech workers in West Virginia is $35.29.
Tech jobs account for 17.7 percent of the total workforce in the Mountain State.
No. 6: Arkansas
Average Tech Worker Salary: $73,390
The average hourly wage for tech workers in Arkansas is $35.28.
Tech jobs account for 14.7 percent of the total workforce in the Natural State.
No. 5: North Dakota
Average Tech Worker Salary: $71,820
The average hourly wage for tech workers in North Dakota is $34.53.
Tech jobs account for 15.3 percent of the total workforce in the Peace Garden State.
No. 4: Mississippi
Average Tech Worker Salary: $71,720
The average hourly wage for tech workers in Mississippi is $34.48.
Tech jobs account for 11.7 percent of the total workforce in the Magnolia State.
No. 3: Montana
Average Tech Worker Salary: $71,540
The average hourly wage for tech workers in Montana is $34.40.
Tech jobs account for 14.0 percent of the total workforce in the Treasure State.
No. 2: South Dakota
Average Tech Worker Salary: $70,000
The average hourly wage for tech workers in South Dakota is $33.65.
Tech jobs account for 14.3 percent of the total workforce in the Mount Rushmore State.
No. 1: Wyoming
Average Tech Worker Salary: $67,640
The average hourly wage for tech workers in Wyoming is $32.52.
Tech jobs account for 12.5 percent of the total workforce in the Cowboy State.
No. 41: Connecticut
Average Tech Worker Salary: $95,550
The average hourly wage for tech workers in Connecticut is $45.94.
Tech jobs account for 20.8 percent of the total workforce in the Constitution State.
No. 42: Delaware
Average Tech Worker Salary: $99,340
The average hourly wage for tech workers in Delaware is $47.76.
Tech jobs account for 26.9 percent of the total workforce in the First State.
No. 43: Colorado
Average Tech Worker Salary: $100,520
The average hourly wage for tech workers in Colorado is $48.33.
Tech jobs account for 19.7 percent of the total workforce in the Centennial State.
No. 44: New York
Average Tech Worker Salary: $103,280
The average hourly wage for tech workers in New York is $49.65.
Tech jobs account for 22.6 percent of the total workforce in the Empire State.
No. 45: New Jersey
Average Tech Worker Salary: $104,090
The average hourly wage for tech workers in New Jersey is $50.04.
Tech jobs account for 20.7 percent of the total workforce in the Garden State.
No. 46: Maryland
Average Tech Worker Salary: $105,550
The average hourly wage for tech workers in Maryland is $50.55.
Tech jobs account for 20.1 percent of the total workforce in the Old Line State.
No. 47: Massachusetts
Average Tech Worker Salary: $105,400
The average hourly wage for tech workers in Massachusetts is $50.67.
Tech jobs account for 29.4 percent of the total workforce in the Bay State.
No. 48: Virginia
Average Tech Worker Salary: $107,130
The average hourly wage for tech workers in Virginia is $51.50.
Tech jobs account for 17.5 percent of the total workforce in the Old Dominion State.
No. 49: California
Average Tech Worker Salary: $116,820
The average hourly wage for tech workers in California is $56.16.
Tech jobs account for 23.7 percent of the total workforce in the Golden State.
No. 50: Washington
Average Tech Worker Salary: $122,640
The average hourly wage for tech workers in Washington is $58.96.
Tech jobs account for 28.1 percent of the total workforce in the Evergreen State.