Labor Market Pulse · Finance · September 2026
Finance Labor Market Report: Lincoln, NE MSA — September 2026
Lincoln finance pay splits: leadership cools, analyst roles heat up.
Controller pay in Lincoln fell to a $89,802 median against a rising $113,754 national figure, while Financial Analyst pay climbed to $90,953 even as statewide finance and insurance wages grew 7.1% year-over-year.
Free archive edition. Published by WageScape as sent to subscribers; data as of September 2026.
Key indicators
- Lincoln unemployment rate: 2.6% — August 2026, vs 2.9% Nebraska, 4.1% U.S.
- NE finance/insurance wage growth: 7.1% — vs 3.1% all-industry NE average
- Open jobs per unemployed (NE): <1.5 — Down from ~4.0 in 2022
- U.S. financial activities job losses: -129,000 — Since May 2025, led by insurance carriers
Key takeaways
Senior finance leadership pay is softening locally, not nationally.
Controller advertised pay in Lincoln fell significantly to a $89,802 median while the national median climbed to $113,754 — a widening gap that complicates recruiting for senior finance roles from outside the metro. FP&A Manager shows the same pattern, down significantly locally against a stable national figure, suggesting local demand for senior finance leadership is cooling faster than the broader market.
Financial Analyst is the one role bucking the local slowdown.
Advertised pay for Financial Analyst rose to $90,953 locally, now exceeding the Controller median and tracking close to the $94,782 national figure. Current conditions suggest employers are competing harder for analytical capacity even as they pull back on senior finance leadership hiring — a sign that finance functions may be flattening hierarchies rather than cutting headcount outright.
Tax Specialist and Credit Analyst pay reveal a widening metro discount.
Tax Specialist advertised pay dropped significantly to $47,561 against a national median of $65,842, and Credit Analyst sits at $49,684 versus $71,758 nationally — gaps too large to explain by cost of living alone. This may signal under-benchmarked roles at risk of losing candidates to remote national postings, particularly as hybrid and remote finance work normalizes.
Nebraska's finance wage growth outpaces the state, not the sector's headcount.
Finance and insurance wages grew 7.1% statewide, the second-fastest of any industry behind information, even as national financial activities employment has shed 129,000 jobs since mid-2025. Rising pay without rising headcount is consistent with employers paying up to retain scarce finance talent while automation and shared services absorb routine workload growth.
Median advertised pay by role — Lincoln, NE MSA
| Role | 25th percentile | Median advertised pay | 75th percentile | Metro trend | National median |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Controller | $52,520 | $89,802 | $92,708 | Significant decline | $113,754 |
| Senior Accountant | $72,144 | $76,135 | $79,735 | Stable | $87,731 |
| Financial Analyst | $73,492 | $90,953 | $109,443 | Moderate increase | $94,782 |
| Billing Specialist | $37,605 | $46,852 | $47,421 | Moderate decline | $49,512 |
| Tax Specialist | $39,798 | $47,561 | $62,165 | Significant decline | $65,842 |
| Credit Analyst | $48,824 | $49,684 | $49,731 | Stable | $71,758 |
| FP&A Manager | $82,864 | $91,566 | $108,988 | Significant decline | $128,139 |
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
Lincoln's unemployment rate held at 2.6% in August, among the tightest readings in the country, even as state-level data show the open-jobs-to-unemployed ratio compressing from nearly 4-to-1 in 2022 to under 1.5-to-1 today — a structural rebalancing, not a local anomaly. Finance and insurance wages in Nebraska rose 7.1% year-over-year, outpacing the state's 3.1% all-industry average, while national financial activities payrolls have contracted by 129,000 since May 2025, creating a split market where local scarcity and national contraction are pushing against each other simultaneously.
What it means
Nebraska's finance and insurance wage growth of 7.1% — more than double the statewide average — signals that compensation cost escalation for finance talent is outrunning general labor cost planning assumptions, even as national sector headcount contracts and automation absorbs routine F&A work. Controller and FP&A Manager advertised pay in Lincoln is down significantly even as national medians rise or hold, suggesting local demand softness for senior finance leadership roles relative to a tightening market for operational finance and analyst talent. Consider reviewing headcount cost models separately by role tier — senior finance leadership may permit more conservative budget assumptions than operational and analyst roles, where local pay for Financial Analyst is actually moving up against a flat national trend.
Looking ahead
Worth watching: National F&A hiring surveys show 74% of finance and accounting leaders planning to increase permanent headcount in the second half of 2026, alongside a Talent Shortage Index jump to 77% from a 2025 surplus reading. Watch whether this national hiring intent shows up in Lincoln postings given the metro's currently soft Controller and FP&A Manager advertised pay.
Emerging pressure point: Nebraska's open-jobs-to-unemployed ratio has fallen from near 4-to-1 in 2022 to under 1.5-to-1 as of July, and Kansas City Fed surveys show more Nebraska employers expecting smaller headcounts by early 2026 than expecting growth. Finance leaders should weigh whether this rebalancing changes the urgency of counteroffers and retention spend for mid-level finance staff.
Potential inflection point: September's national average hourly earnings growth decelerated to 3.0% year-over-year, below the 3.2% consensus estimate, easing broad wage pressure just as Nebraska's finance-specific wages run at 7.1%. Divergence between national deceleration and local finance-sector acceleration is worth tracking into Q4 budget cycles.
Early indicator: Nebraska's new state WARN Act (LB 921) took effect July 17, requiring 90-day notice for mass layoffs affecting 100+ employees, improving visibility into workforce reductions. Finance leaders modeling contingent labor or interim coverage should monitor early filings under the new law for signals of talent becoming available in adjacent sectors.
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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