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Salary data from BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics

Financial Specialists, All Other Salary: Portland-South Portland, ME vs New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ

Financial Specialists, All Other earn a median of $83,430 in Portland-South Portland, ME and $108,970 in New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ. That is a nominal gap of $25,540 (-23.4%), with New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ paying more before any cost-of-living adjustment.

Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics survey, May 2024 estimates. Cost-of-living adjustment uses BEA Regional Price Parities, most recent release.

$83,430
Portland-South Portland, ME median
$81,908 after COL
$108,970
New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ median
$96,808 after COL
-23.4%
Nominal gap
New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ leads
-15.4%
Adjusted gap
New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ leads after COL

The story behind the numbers

On raw wages, New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ pays $25,540 more per year than Portland-South Portland, ME for financial specialists, all other, a gap of +23.4%.

After adjusting for cost of living, New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ still comes out ahead, with roughly $14,900 of extra purchasing power (+15.4% real gap). Local prices do not reverse the nominal advantage.

Full breakdown by location

Detailed wage, employment, and cost-of-living figures for financial specialists, all other in each location. Click through to the full local salary page for percentiles, outlook, and peer areas.

Financial Specialists, All Other

Portland-South Portland, ME

Median salary
$83,430
Mean salary
$85,440
Employment
330
Location quotient
1.40
Jobs per 1,000
1.2
COL-adjusted median
$81,908
Regional Price Parity
101.9%

Exact metro RPP match.

Full Financial Specialists, All Other page for Portland-South Portland, ME →

Financial Specialists, All Other

New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ

Median salary
$108,970
Mean salary
$152,750
Employment
8,690
Location quotient
1.12
Jobs per 1,000
0.9
COL-adjusted median
$96,808
Regional Price Parity
112.6%

Exact metro RPP match.

Full Financial Specialists, All Other page for New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ →

Related pages

Keep digging into financial specialists, all other from a different angle.

Common questions about this comparison

What does the cost-of-living adjustment actually do? +

It divides each location's nominal median wage by its Regional Price Parity (RPP), which measures how local prices compare to the national average (100 = national). A wage of $100,000 in an area with RPP 120 has the same purchasing power as roughly $83,000 nationally.

Why would the nominal and adjusted winners disagree? +

High-cost metros often pay higher salaries, but not by enough to fully offset the higher cost of housing, goods, and services. When that happens, the location with the lower nominal wage actually offers more real purchasing power.

What is a location quotient? +

The location quotient measures how concentrated an occupation is in a given area versus the national average. A value of 2.0 means the occupation is twice as common there as nationally. It is a signal of what a metro specializes in.