Metro Job Market Pulse · General Market Conditions · September 2026
General Market Conditions Labor Market Report: Rochester, NY MSA — September 2026
Rochester employment contracts at its sharpest pace since 2020.
Rochester metro payrolls fell 0.5% year-over-year through July with unemployment at 4.2% in August, even as statewide wage growth of 6.5% and national payroll gains of just 29,000 in September suggest the softening is locally concentrated, not purely a national echo.
Free archive edition. Published by WageScape as sent to subscribers; data as of September 2026.
Key indicators
- Rochester metro unemployment: 4.2% — Up from 4.0% in June 2026
- Rochester nonfarm payroll growth: -0.5% YoY — 514,400 jobs as of July 2026
- Average monthly job change, 2026: -425 jobs/month — Vs +317/month average in 2025
- Monroe County unemployment: 4.4% — Above metro and NY state averages
Key takeaways
Rochester's job losses are now the steepest since 2020.
Average monthly employment decline of 425 jobs in 2026 reverses the 2025 pattern of modest growth and signals a genuine contraction, not merely slower expansion. This bears watching as a leading indicator for local consumer spending and commercial activity.
Manufacturing and professional services are doing the heavy lifting on decline.
Financial activities, professional services, and information sectors all registered year-over-year employment losses locally, mirroring the statewide pattern of finance and government softness. Education and health services remain the lone pillar of growth, consistent with national sector divergence favoring hands-on service work.
AI-skill postings tripled in six months — a structural signal, not noise.
Entry-level postings referencing AI skills rose from 11% to 33% between roughly January and July 2026, a pace too fast to attribute to normal market drift. Commerce and workforce-development leaders may want to track whether local training pipelines are adjusting at a comparable speed.
Local wage growth in skilled trades outpaces broader metro softness.
CDL truck driver and electrician pay both moved up significantly even as metro-wide employment contracted, suggesting localized labor tightness in specific trades persists independent of the broader slowdown. This divergence is worth monitoring as a signal of where local demand remains resilient.
Median advertised pay by role — Rochester, NY MSA
| Role | 25th percentile | Median advertised pay | 75th percentile | Metro trend | National median |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Retail Sales Associate | $30,967 | $34,840 | $36,400 | Stable | $33,325 |
| Retail Cashier | $31,339 | $34,840 | $35,360 | Stable | $31,200 |
| Warehouse/Fulfillment Associate | $35,048 | $39,520 | $41,600 | Stable | $38,000 |
| CDL Truck Driver | $55,120 | $80,600 | $95,000 | Significant increase | $78,000 |
| Delivery Driver | $31,261 | $35,000 | $39,763 | Stable | $34,344 |
| Construction Laborer | $34,619 | $43,680 | $49,920 | Stable | $40,560 |
| Electrician | $58,240 | $72,800 | $83,000 | Significant increase | $71,404 |
| Manufacturing Production Worker/Assembler | $33,767 | $40,560 | $43,680 | Stable | $39,520 |
| Customer Service Representative | $36,737 | $41,475 | $45,760 | Moderate increase | $39,520 |
| Food Service Worker | $33,280 | $34,840 | $36,920 | Stable | $33,756 |
| Certified Nursing Assistant / Home Health Aide | $37,960 | $43,056 | $46,641 | Moderate increase | $41,106 |
| Administrative Assistant/Office Clerk | $36,400 | $43,680 | $47,501 | Moderate increase | $43,680 |
| HVAC Technician | $58,435 | $66,560 | $73,388 | Stable | $70,720 |
| Registered Nurse | $90,191 | $114,081 | $126,059 | Significant increase | $102,581 |
| Software Engineer | $104,719 | $138,796 | $155,914 | Significant increase | $153,652 |
| Data Engineer | $90,338 | $103,367 | $131,160 | Significant decline | $139,500 |
| Accountant | $58,542 | $68,459 | $72,974 | Stable | $72,182 |
| Financial Analyst | $70,450 | $87,497 | $90,306 | Significant increase | $94,782 |
| HR Generalist/Manager | $54,080 | $70,000 | $76,440 | Moderate increase | $75,000 |
| Marketing Specialist | $50,520 | $65,000 | $78,000 | Significant increase | $62,354 |
| Operations Manager | $77,500 | $81,400 | $84,250 | Significant increase | $85,216 |
| Elementary/Secondary School Teacher | $37,440 | $54,045 | $59,110 | Moderate increase | $56,731 |
| Account Manager | $63,773 | $85,742 | $93,420 | Significant increase | $92,749 |
| Warehouse Manager * | $47,232 | $62,774 | $75,021 | Significant increase | $75,000 |
| Business Analyst | $74,976 | $89,705 | $101,280 | Stable | $98,279 |
* 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
Industry snapshot
| Sector | Median advertised pay | Pay trend | Postings trend |
|---|---|---|---|
| Construction | $62,400 | Moderate increase | Significant decline |
| Manufacturing | $72,500 | Significant increase | Significant increase |
| Retail Trade | $37,440 | Moderate increase | Moderate increase |
| Transportation, Warehousing & Utilities | $43,680 | Stable | Significant increase |
| Information | $62,712 | Moderate increase | Moderate decline |
| Financial Activities | $67,402 | Stable | Stable |
| Professional & Business Services | $57,055 | Moderate increase | Significant increase |
| Education & Health Services | $59,556 | Significant increase | Moderate decline |
| Leisure & Hospitality | $35,360 | Stable | Stable |
| Government | $66,261 | Significant increase | Significant decline |
Local market conditions
Rochester metro employment contracted 0.5% year-over-year through July 2026, with unemployment climbing to 4.2% in August, as manufacturing, financial services, and professional services continue shedding positions even as education and health services post modest gains. Softening is consistent with the statewide pattern of concentrated growth masking broad stagnation, though the metro's monthly average job loss of 425 positions in 2026 marks its weakest labor market reading since 2020.
What it means
Contracting payrolls alongside a stable-to-rising unemployment rate point to a local economy cooling rather than overheating, which argues for caution on capital expansion timed to tight-labor assumptions and more weight on demand-side indicators before committing to growth-stage investment. Wage gains concentrated in healthcare, skilled trades, and select professional roles (registered nurses up significantly, financial analysts up significantly) suggest any remaining momentum is sector-specific rather than metro-wide. Commerce leaders should consider evaluating expansion or investment timing against sector-level data rather than metro-wide averages, since the aggregate unemployment figure obscures meaningfully different conditions across manufacturing, healthcare, and professional services.
Looking ahead
Worth watching: Monroe County's 4.4% unemployment rate sits above both the metro and state averages; watch whether the September reading narrows or widens that gap as a read on whether softening is broadening beyond the urban core.
Emerging pressure point: New York recorded 46 WARN notices in the past 90 days concentrated in healthcare, manufacturing, and transportation statewide; any Rochester-specific filings in these sectors over the next two months would corroborate the metro's contraction narrative rather than leave it reliant on aggregate payroll data alone.
Early indicator: Continued acceleration in AI-related skill requirements across entry-level postings may signal a faster-than-expected shift in the composition of local labor demand, relevant to regional workforce training investment decisions.
Potential inflection point: National payroll growth has slowed to roughly 29,000-90,000 per month with real wages no longer outpacing inflation; a continuation of that national trend would likely remove any cushion for Rochester's already-contracting job base over the next two reporting cycles.
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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