Labor Market Pulse · Finance · August 2026
Finance Labor Market Report: Sioux City, IA-NE-SD MSA — August 2026
Sioux City finance pay splits: leadership up, technical roles down.
Controller pay climbed to a $88,044 metro median and FP&A Manager to $132,518, while Financial Analyst pay fell to $71,601 against a stable $82,905 national figure.
Free archive edition. Published by WageScape as sent to subscribers; data as of August 2026.
Key indicators
- Sioux City MSA unemployment: 2.8% — vs 4.1% national, 3.2% Iowa (May 2026 proxy)
- Iowa workforce attrition: -7,500 YoY — Largely retirement-driven, statewide
- Controller advertised pay, metro: $88,044 — Up significantly vs $112,500 national median
- Iowa UI Trust Fund balance: $2.1B — Enables lowest employer tax rates for 2027
Key takeaways
Controller and FP&A pay are outrunning the metro's own baseline.
Controller advertised pay rose to a $88,044 metro median against a $112,500 national figure, and FP&A Manager pay at $132,518 now sits above the national median of $127,341 — both moving up significantly locally while national figures held stable. Local employers appear to be bidding aggressively for planning and reporting leadership even as broader metro wage growth stays modest.
Tax and analyst roles are quietly losing local pricing power.
Financial Analyst pay fell significantly to $71,601 versus a stable $82,905 national median, and Tax Specialist pay dropped to $46,370 against a national figure rising to $66,725. Widening gaps against national medians may signal weaker local demand for these functions or a supply pool concentrated at the entry level — either scenario complicates recruiting for specialized technical roles.
Iowa's UI tax relief offsets some of the hiring cost pressure.
Iowa's UI Trust Fund reached $2.1 billion, securing the lowest possible employer tax rates for 2027 even as retirement-driven labor force attrition tightens supply. Payroll cost relief on the unemployment insurance side gives Finance some room to absorb rising advertised pay in strategic roles without total labor cost expanding in lockstep.
AI-skill premiums are a national signal metro Finance teams can't ignore.
82% of F&A leaders nationally now pay premiums for AI skills, with technical accounting and SEC roles commanding 6–15% AI-related premiums and machine learning skills adding up to 56% to salaries. Sioux City's smaller finance talent pool means even modest local adoption of these premiums could reset expectations for controller and FP&A candidates faster than budget cycles anticipate.
Median advertised pay by role — Sioux City, IA-NE-SD MSA
| Role | 25th percentile | Median advertised pay | 75th percentile | Metro trend | National median |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Controller | $74,994 | $88,044 | $94,534 | Significant increase | $112,500 |
| Senior Accountant | $70,422 | $85,000 | $97,500 | Significant increase | $87,731 |
| Financial Analyst | $68,122 | $71,601 | $88,451 | Significant decline | $82,905 |
| Billing Specialist | $35,562 | $37,046 | $37,111 | Moderate decline | $49,700 |
| Tax Specialist * | $33,679 | $46,370 | $60,506 | Significant decline | $66,725 |
| Credit Analyst * | $55,244 | $63,135 | $63,526 | Moderate increase | $72,000 |
| FP&A Manager * | $104,638 | $132,518 | $136,259 | Significant increase | $127,341 |
* 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
Sioux City's tri-state labor market remains historically tight, with the metro tracking below the 4.1% national and 3.2% Iowa unemployment rates while manufacturing and healthcare hiring absorb available workers across meat processing, agriculture, and light industry. Iowa's retirement-driven workforce exit — 7,500 fewer working residents statewide year-over-year — compounds local scarcity just as Finance departments nationally report 90% of leaders struggling to fill roles, pointing to a supply-constrained market rather than a demand-driven one.
What it means
Finance leaders in Sioux City face a labor pool shrinking from retirement outflows rather than layoffs, meaning headcount plans built on historical fill rates likely understate time-to-hire for close, FP&A, and controller-track roles. Divergent local advertised pay — Controller and FP&A Manager up significantly while Financial Analyst and Tax Specialist compress well below national medians — suggests budget-cycle roles are commanding premiums while transactional and compliance roles face local demand softness. Consider reviewing headcount cost models by role tier rather than department-wide, since the metro's pay signal is bifurcating sharply between strategic and transactional finance functions.
Looking ahead
Worth watching: Iowa's healthcare and manufacturing hiring gains (5,700 and 1,300 jobs respectively year-over-year) could pull talent from finance support functions in Sioux City if wage competition intensifies. Watch whether Financial Analyst and Tax Specialist advertised pay stabilizes or continues declining as a signal of true demand versus a temporary reporting artifact.
Emerging pressure point: Iowa's workforce fell by 7,500 over the year, largely from retirement, with the state's labor force participation rank still third-highest nationally — a ceiling that limits how much further participation can rise to offset attrition. Finance leaders should monitor whether Sioux City's tighter local unemployment rate (historically below 3%) begins constraining candidate volume for controller-level searches.
Potential inflection point: National WARN filings (3,562 notices, 313,234 workers in 2026) and Iowa's own 76 mass-layoff notices affecting 3,085 workers include finance-adjacent cuts like Wells Fargo's 43-employee filing in August. A meaningful uptick in released finance talent entering the tri-state candidate pool could ease the current premium pricing on Controller and FP&A roles.
Expected: BLS metro-level unemployment and wage data for August 2026 typically lags until late September, so current MSA figures remain proxied through May county-level and December 2025 nonfarm data. Expect a data refresh next cycle that may reprice the tightness narrative once official August metro figures post.
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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