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Salary data from BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics

Shampooers Salary: California vs District of Columbia

Shampooers earn a median of $35,970 in California and $36,320 in District of Columbia. That is a nominal gap of $350 (-1.0%), with District of Columbia 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.

$35,970
California median
$32,487 after COL
$36,320
District of Columbia median
$33,048 after COL
-1.0%
Nominal gap
District of Columbia leads
-1.7%
Adjusted gap
District of Columbia leads after COL

The story behind the numbers

On raw wages, District of Columbia pays $350 more per year than California for shampooers, a gap of +1.0%.

After adjusting for cost of living, District of Columbia still comes out ahead, with roughly $561 of extra purchasing power (+1.7% real gap). Local prices do not reverse the nominal advantage.

Full breakdown by location

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

Shampooers

California

Median salary
$35,970
Mean salary
$35,640
Employment
1,790
Location quotient
1.72
Jobs per 1,000
0.1
COL-adjusted median
$32,487
Regional Price Parity
110.7%

Exact state RPP match.

Full Shampooers page for California →

Shampooers

District of Columbia

Median salary
$36,320
Mean salary
$36,260
Employment
200
Location quotient
4.80
Jobs per 1,000
0.3
COL-adjusted median
$33,048
Regional Price Parity
109.9%

Exact state RPP match.

Full Shampooers page for District of Columbia →

Related pages

Keep digging into shampooers 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 state specializes in.