Labor Market Pulse · Finance · September 2026
Finance Labor Market Report: Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL — September 2026
Tampa Finance pay outruns a shrinking national sector.
FP&A Manager advertised pay climbed to $135,454 in Tampa even as financial activities shed 129,000 jobs nationally since May 2025, underscoring a local talent market moving independently of the broader sector contraction.
Free archive edition. Published by WageScape as sent to subscribers; data as of September 2026.
Key indicators
- FP&A Manager advertised pay, metro: $135,454 — vs $128,139 national, up significantly local
- National financial activities job losses: 129,000 — Since May 2025, concentrated in insurance carriers
- F&A Talent Shortage Index: 77% — vs 108% surplus reading in 2025
- Hillsborough County avg weekly wage: $1,658 — vs $1,654 national average, Q1 2026
Key takeaways
National Finance job losses mask local hiring competition.
Financial activities lost 129,000 jobs nationally since May 2025, concentrated in insurance carriers, while Tampa Bay's accounting hiring competition rates "High" and FP&A Manager pay climbed to $135,454 locally. Treat national sector softness as noise for Tampa headcount models — local scarcity signals carry more weight here.
FP&A Manager pay is pulling away from the national median.
Metro advertised pay for FP&A Manager sits at $135,454 against a stable national median of $128,139, a significant local premium that wasn't present a year ago. This looks consistent with Tampa's broader skills-gap pressure — 76% of finance leaders report critical gaps in financial modeling and analytics capability.
Minimum wage escalation reshapes entry-level cost planning permanently.
Florida's minimum wage rises to $15 on September 30, 2026, with CPI-W-indexed increases every year after. Billing Specialist pay already moved up moderately to $49,500 locally — long-range headcount cost models should now assume annual statutory wage escalation rather than periodic step increases.
CPA pipeline shortage is shifting from warning to constraint.
National Talent Shortage Index for F&A swung from a 108% surplus in 2025 to a 77% shortage reading in 2026, alongside a 134% hiring index signaling pandemic-level demand. Tampa's Senior Accountant pay remains stable at $85,155 despite this — a potential signal that advertised pay hasn't yet caught up to underlying scarcity.
Median advertised pay by role — Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL
| Role | 25th percentile | Median advertised pay | 75th percentile | Metro trend | National median |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Controller | $90,000 | $120,980 | $128,044 | Stable | $113,754 |
| Senior Accountant | $79,077 | $85,155 | $91,152 | Stable | $87,731 |
| Financial Analyst | $71,094 | $90,000 | $99,149 | Significant increase | $94,782 |
| Billing Specialist | $38,670 | $49,500 | $58,477 | Moderate increase | $49,512 |
| Tax Specialist | $43,717 | $62,020 | $69,666 | Significant increase | $65,842 |
| Credit Analyst | $43,472 | $71,679 | $77,460 | Moderate increase | $71,758 |
| FP&A Manager | $109,167 | $135,454 | $147,036 | Significant increase | $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
Tampa Bay's Finance and professional services hiring continues to defy the national financial activities contraction — the sector has shed 129,000 jobs nationally since May 2025, yet Hillsborough County's average weekly wage of $1,658 in Q1 2026 outpaced the national figure, and CareerSource Tampa Bay flags Finance and Professional Services as a targeted local growth sector. Florida's September 30 minimum wage increase to $15 (moving toward $16 after 2026) compounds this tightness by pushing up entry-level payroll costs just as local accounting hiring competition registers "High" and candidate supply remains constrained.
What it means
National softening in average hourly earnings growth (0.13% in September, below economist expectations) offers Finance leaders rare budget relief at the macro level, but Tampa's localized scarcity in specialized roles — FP&A Manager advertised pay up significantly to $135,454 against a stable national figure — suggests this relief will not reach every requisition equally. Headcount planning should separate commodity accounting functions, where automation and shared services are increasingly absorbing volume nationally, from scarce specialized skills (financial modeling, ERP, data analytics) where 87% of finance leaders report paying premiums. Consider reviewing budget assumptions role-by-role rather than applying a single blended wage inflation figure across the Finance organization.
Looking ahead
Expected: Florida's minimum wage increase to $15 takes effect September 30, with tipped wages rising to $11.98 — watch for compression effects pushing up pay for roles just above minimum wage, including Billing Specialist and entry-level accounting clerks.
Emerging pressure point: National insurance carrier job losses (-90,000 since May 2025) could eventually release finance talent into secondary metros; monitor whether displaced insurance-finance professionals begin appearing in Tampa's candidate pool given the region's financial services growth narrative.
Worth watching: Nearly half of organizations nationally expect direct labor rate increases above 4% for F&A roles even as headline wage growth decelerates — watch whether Tampa's FP&A Manager and Tax Specialist premiums (both up significantly) continue widening against national medians or begin to normalize.
Potential inflection point: 74% of finance leaders nationally plan to increase permanent headcount in the second half of 2026 while automation absorbs routine F&A work — watch whether Tampa's job growth (12,500 added in August) reflects genuine headcount expansion or backfill tied to the CPA pipeline shortage.
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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