Labor Market Pulse · Information Technology · October 2026
Information Technology Labor Market Report: Hattiesburg, MS MSA — October 2026
Hattiesburg IT pay climbs as the labor pool shrinks.
Systems Administrator advertised pay hit $104,544 locally — above the $102,503 national figure — even as Hattiesburg's civilian labor force kept contracting through August.
Free archive edition. Published by WageScape as sent to subscribers; data as of October 2026.
Key indicators
- Hattiesburg unemployment rate: 2.9% — vs 3.3% Mississippi, 4.1% national
- Metro job growth, August 2026: 0 jobs added — Following +300 jobs in July 2026
- Civilian labor force trend: Declining — Both month-over-month and year-over-year
- Statewide tech talent exodus: 30% — Share of bachelor's grads leaving MS post-grad
Key takeaways
Systems Administrator pay now exceeds the national figure locally.
Metro median of $104,544 against a national median of $102,503 is unusual for this market and suggests employers are paying a scarcity premium. Treat this as a signal that on-prem and hybrid infrastructure talent is harder to source locally than national data would imply.
Network Engineer and Cybersecurity Analyst pay is climbing faster locally than nationally.
Both roles show 'significant' local wage movement against only 'moderate' national gains, even though metro medians ($94,945 and $84,897) remain below national levels ($115,757 and $107,327). Compensation strategy should assume the gap is closing faster than national benchmarks suggest, particularly as state cybersecurity liability protections stalled in the Senate, leaving compliance costs — and the staff to manage them — on employers.
Help Desk and IT Project Manager pay is softening against a tight labor supply.
Help Desk advertised pay fell significantly to $44,096 and IT Project Manager pay dropped moderately to $95,729, even as the broader labor force contracts. This divergence may suggest employers are deprioritizing these functions in favor of infrastructure and security hiring, or shifting support work toward outsourced or offshore models.
Data Scientist pay sits far below national levels, exposing a build-vs-buy fork.
Metro median of $66,427 against a national median of $145,881 — a gap too wide to close through local hiring alone. Organizations should evaluate whether specialized analytics work is better sourced through contract, remote-national, or vendor arrangements given the near-absent local talent pool.
Median advertised pay by role — Hattiesburg, MS MSA
| Role | 25th percentile | Median advertised pay | 75th percentile | Metro trend | National median |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Data Scientist | $66,426 | $66,427 | $84,346 | Significant increase | $145,881 |
| Systems Administrator | $91,116 | $104,544 | $123,383 | Significant increase | $102,503 |
| Network Engineer * | $65,539 | $94,945 | $102,871 | Significant increase | $115,757 |
| Software Engineer * | $112,505 | $155,000 | $168,330 | Significant increase | $154,403 |
| Help Desk/IT Support Specialist * | $39,067 | $44,096 | $50,429 | Significant decline | $53,129 |
| Cybersecurity Analyst | $84,897 | $84,897 | $84,897 | Significant increase | $107,327 |
| IT Project Manager * | $73,840 | $95,729 | $109,348 | Moderate decline | $118,150 |
* State-level figure shown where metro postings were too few.
WageScape's median is calibrated to correct for spurious low-value postings (reported as the 60th percentile of raw advertised pay). Download: CSV · JSON
Local market conditions
Hattiesburg's unemployment rate held at 2.9% in August 2026, but the civilian labor force contracted both month over month and year over year, and nonfarm employment was flat after gaining just 300 jobs in July — signaling a market constrained by limited labor supply. Camp Shelby, USM, and William Carey anchor a regional economy where talent scarcity appears to be the binding constraint on IT headcount growth.
What it means
Flat employment growth alongside a shrinking labor force means IT leaders competing for local talent face a shallower candidate pool each quarter, even as advertised pay moving up sharply across Systems Administrator, Network Engineer, and Cybersecurity Analyst roles locally is consistent with employers bidding for a limited supply. Mississippi's statewide software developer wage gap (33% below national mean) and the fact that only 70% of bachelor's graduates stay in-state compound the risk that build-your-own-talent strategies lose ground to remote and offshore sourcing. Consider evaluating whether infrastructure and security roles with sharp local wage gains warrant hybrid or remote-eligible postings to widen the applicant pool beyond Forrest County's contracting labor force.
Looking ahead
Worth watching: Civilian labor force contraction in Hattiesburg has persisted for multiple months alongside flat job growth; watch whether this reflects retirement, out-migration, or discouraged-worker effects, each of which calls for a different hiring response.
Emerging pressure point: Mississippi's failed cybersecurity liability protection legislation leaves breach-related costs uncapped, which may push CISOs to request higher security staffing budgets in Q1 planning cycles even as Cybersecurity Analyst advertised pay is already rising sharply.
Potential inflection point: State ITS cloud role postings (AWS, Azure, Senior Infrastructure Engineer) signal public-sector migration that could pull scarce infrastructure talent away from private employers; monitor whether state pay scales begin competing directly with metro advertised rates.
Early indicator: National tech layoffs have already exceeded 133,000 for 2026, concentrated in large tech hubs; track whether any of that displaced talent surfaces in the Hattiesburg candidate pool via remote-eligible postings, given 41% of technologists nationally say they would trade salary for flexibility.
Sources
- Mississippi Today — Hattiesburg unemployment rate at 2.9% in August 2026
- USA Facts / Bureau of Labor Statistics — Metro gained 300 jobs in July, zero in August 2026
- Mississippi IT labor market research notes — Only 70% of Mississippi bachelor's graduates stay in-state
- Bureau of Labor Statistics / state wage data — Mississippi software developers earn 33% below national mean
- Mississippi state legislative research notes — Mississippi cybersecurity liability protection bill failed Senate passage
- Layoffs tracking aggregator — 133,417 tech employees laid off at 325 companies through Oct 21, 2026
Methodology
Advertised pay from active employer job postings, not survey data. WageScape's median is calibrated to correct for spurious low-value postings: distribution analysis shows roughly the lowest 10% of raw values are erroneous entries, so the reported median is the 60th percentile of raw advertised pay. WageScape observes 98% of U.S. job openings daily.
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