Labor Market Pulse · Information Technology · September 2026
Information Technology Labor Market Report: Pascagoula, MS MSA — September 2026
Pascagoula IT pay splits sharply between scarcity and commodity roles.
Systems Administrator pay climbed to $100,000 and Cybersecurity Analyst pay rose to $87,188 in Pascagoula, even as Help Desk pay fell to $42,189 — a widening gap that mirrors the metro's 3.5% unemployment rate sitting well below the 4.1% national rate.
Free archive edition. Published by WageScape as sent to subscribers; data as of September 2026.
Key indicators
- Jackson County unemployment rate: 3.5% — vs 3.7% MS, 4.1% national (July/Sept 2026)
- Help Desk advertised pay: $42,189 — down significantly vs $53,644 national median
- MS remote vs on-site IT pay gap: $64,749 vs $44,654 — 46% premium for remote roles statewide
- MS IT jobs offered remote: 6% — 92% remain on-site, constraining talent access
Key takeaways
Help Desk pay is collapsing while admin roles climb.
Metro Help Desk/IT Support median fell to $42,189, far below the $53,644 national figure, even as Systems Administrator pay rose to $100,000 — nearly matching the national median. Support roles look increasingly commoditized locally while technical operations roles hold real scarcity value.
Project Manager pay drop may signal reduced coordination investment.
IT Project Manager advertised pay fell significantly to $103,561, moving against a national trend that's up moderately to $117,530. This divergence is consistent with employers in a shipbuilding- and manufacturing-heavy metro prioritizing hands-on technical execution over project oversight layers — worth testing before assuming it reflects weaker demand generally.
Network Engineer pay still trails the national rate by nearly 20%.
Metro Network Engineer pay rose significantly to $95,398 but remains well below the $114,400 national median, a gap that mirrors Mississippi's broader remote-pay premium problem. Expect continued difficulty retaining networking talent against remote offers unless the gap closes further.
Cybersecurity pay gains locally but lags the national premium badly.
Metro Cybersecurity Analyst pay rose significantly to $87,188, yet sits more than $19,000 below the $106,790 national median — in a year when national cybersecurity compensation is running toward $191,700 on average per Lorien Global. Local employers competing for security talent may be underpricing a role with structural, not cyclical, demand growth.
Median advertised pay by role — Pascagoula, MS MSA
| Role | 25th percentile | Median advertised pay | 75th percentile | Metro trend | National median |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Data Scientist * | $90,376 | $120,644 | $135,751 | Significant increase | $148,250 |
| Systems Administrator | $78,477 | $100,000 | $100,000 | Significant increase | $101,168 |
| Network Engineer | $85,761 | $95,398 | $99,365 | Significant increase | $114,400 |
| Software Engineer * | $107,278 | $152,955 | $164,803 | Significant increase | $153,652 |
| Help Desk/IT Support Specialist | $41,626 | $42,189 | $45,212 | Significant decline | $53,644 |
| Cybersecurity Analyst | $76,230 | $87,188 | $87,188 | Significant increase | $106,790 |
| IT Project Manager | $89,033 | $103,561 | $103,601 | Significant decline | $117,530 |
* 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
Jackson County's 3.5% unemployment rate sits well below both the Mississippi (3.7%) and national (4.1%) marks, reflecting a manufacturing-driven economy — led by Ingalls Shipbuilding and Chevron — that continues pulling workers into production and skilled trades rather than office-based IT roles. That tight non-tech labor pool, combined with a metro economy where manufacturing generates 52.4% of GDP, is compressing the local candidate base available for infrastructure and support positions and pushing IT compensation in divergent directions depending on role scarcity.
What it means
Metro pay data shows a market bifurcating sharply: Systems Administrator and Network Engineer advertised pay are climbing significantly while Help Desk/IT Support and IT Project Manager pay are falling — a pattern consistent with employers concentrating budget on technical scarcity roles while deprioritizing generalist and coordination functions. With Mississippi's remote IT pay averaging $64,749 versus $44,654 on-site, and only 6% of posted Mississippi IT roles offering remote work, Pascagoula employers face a structural disadvantage competing for cloud and security talent against distributed-work competitors. Consider evaluating whether commodity support and project-coordination functions can shift to contract or outsourced arrangements, freeing budget to defend ground on infrastructure and security roles where local advertised pay is actually accelerating.
Looking ahead
Worth watching: Amazon's $25B data center investment and Compass Datacenters' $10B Meridian campus are both pulling Mississippi IT talent toward data center operations roles. Watch whether Pascagoula-area infrastructure and support staff begin migrating toward these higher-paying opportunities elsewhere in the state.
Emerging pressure point: Mississippi's IT graduate retention drops from roughly 70% in year one to about 47% within a decade, reflecting limited in-state career pathing. Pascagoula employers reliant on early-career IT hires may see this erosion accelerate as data center hiring expands statewide.
Early indicator: Mississippi government IT roles are increasingly advertising hybrid work, a signal that public-sector competition for scarce technical talent is intensifying. If this pressure reaches Jackson County public employers, private IT departments may need to match flexibility terms, not just pay, to retain staff.
Potential inflection point: National IT postings and job creation have turned modestly positive for the first time in nearly four years (Indeed Job Postings Index at 103.5), while WARN layoffs nationally still involve major tech employers like Amazon, Meta and Verizon. Watch whether this releases experienced IT talent into secondary markets like Pascagoula over the next two months.
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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