Skip to content

An independent salary reference. Not affiliated with BLS or any U.S. government agency.

Salary data from BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics

Software Quality Assurance Analysts And Testers Salary: El Paso, TX vs Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA

Software Quality Assurance Analysts And Testers earn a median of $93,130 in El Paso, TX and $131,640 in Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA. That is a nominal gap of $38,510 (-29.3%), with Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA 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.

$93,130
El Paso, TX median
$103,579 after COL
$131,640
Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA median
$118,453 after COL
-29.3%
Nominal gap
Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA leads
-12.6%
Adjusted gap
Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA leads after COL

The story behind the numbers

On raw wages, Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA pays $38,510 more per year than El Paso, TX for software quality assurance analysts and testers, a gap of +29.3%.

After adjusting for cost of living, Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA still comes out ahead, with roughly $14,874 of extra purchasing power (+12.6% real gap). Local prices do not reverse the nominal advantage.

Full breakdown by location

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

Software Quality Assurance Analysts And Testers

El Paso, TX

Median salary
$93,130
Mean salary
$87,520
Employment
230
Location quotient
0.54
Jobs per 1,000
0.7
COL-adjusted median
$103,579
Regional Price Parity
89.9%

Exact metro RPP match.

Full Software Quality Assurance Analysts And Testers page for El Paso, TX →

Software Quality Assurance Analysts And Testers

Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA

Median salary
$131,640
Mean salary
$133,940
Employment
7,300
Location quotient
2.71
Jobs per 1,000
3.5
COL-adjusted median
$118,453
Regional Price Parity
111.1%

Exact metro RPP match.

Full Software Quality Assurance Analysts And Testers page for Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA →

Related pages

Keep digging into software quality assurance analysts and testers 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.