{"schema_version": 1, "id": "champaign-urbana-il-msa/information-technology/2026-09", "product": "Labor Market Pulse", "metro": {"geography_id": 135, "label": "Champaign-Urbana, IL MSA", "slug": "champaign-urbana-il-msa"}, "focus_area": {"key": "information_technology", "slug": "information-technology", "label": "Information Technology"}, "period": "2026-09", "public_after": "2026-09-01", "frozen_at": "2026-10-09T13:14:09.186583+00:00", "headline": "Champaign IT support pay outruns the nation as talent tightens.", "headline_summary": "Help Desk advertised pay hit a metro median of $62,705 against a stable $53,644 nationally, even as local unemployment held at a tight 3.6% versus Illinois's 4.7%.", "key_indicators": [{"label": "Metro unemployment rate", "value": "3.6%", "context": "vs 4.7% Illinois, 4.1% U.S. (Aug 2026)"}, {"label": "Metro nonfarm job growth", "value": "+0.3% YoY", "context": "400 jobs added through June 2026"}, {"label": "Help Desk advertised pay", "value": "$62,705", "context": "vs $53,644 national median, up significantly"}, {"label": "Illinois tech hiring growth", "value": "+11% MoM", "context": "August 2026, statewide"}], "takeaways": [{"headline": "Help Desk pay growth outpaces every other local IT role.", "body": "Metro Help Desk/IT Support median advertised pay of $62,705 is up significantly and now sits well above the stable national median of $53,644. A tight 3.6% local unemployment rate appears to be compressing even the entry tier of IT staffing, undercutting the usual assumption that support roles are easiest to backfill cheaply."}, {"headline": "Systems Administrator demand is outrunning Network Engineer demand.", "body": "Systems Administrator advertised pay rose significantly to $88,250 locally while Network Engineer pay held stable at $83,200. Divergence within traditionally similar infrastructure roles may signal employers prioritizing cloud/hybrid administration skills over legacy network management \u2014 a reallocation worth reflecting in headcount planning rather than pay bands alone."}, {"headline": "Software Engineer pay has plateaued locally while demand elsewhere accelerates.", "body": "Metro Software Engineer median ($170,000) remains stable and already exceeds the national median ($153,652), suggesting the local market \u2014 likely anchored by university-adjacent and research-driven employers \u2014 has already priced in scarcity. Flat movement amid national AI-driven engineering wage spikes of 8-9% may indicate Champaign employers are relying on existing compensation ceilings rather than competing on fresh increases."}, {"headline": "Cybersecurity pay gap with the national market is narrowing.", "body": "Local Cybersecurity Analyst advertised pay ($102,197) is up moderately and now trails the national median ($106,790) by less than 5%, tighter than the gap in most other tracked roles. Convergence is consistent with the statewide pattern of 10-15% mid-level cybersecurity salary growth reported in Illinois, and may signal eroding cost advantage for retaining security talent locally versus Chicago."}], "local_conditions": "Champaign-Urbana's unemployment rate held at 3.6% in August, well below the Illinois statewide rate of 4.7% and the tightest labor supply condition among Illinois metros outside the Quad Cities, even as metro-wide nonfarm job growth remains nearly flat at 0.3% year-over-year through June. Tight labor supply combined with stagnant headcount growth appears to reflect a local economy anchored by University of Illinois employment stability rather than broad-based private-sector expansion, leaving IT employers competing for a shallow local talent pool.", "implications": "Local Systems Administrator and Help Desk advertised pay are both posting significant year-over-year increases \u2014 Systems Administrator up to a $88,250 metro median and Help Desk to $62,705 \u2014 even as the statewide IT hiring pace accelerates and Illinois's new pay transparency law limits negotiation flexibility, a combination that pressures infrastructure and support budgets more than headline unemployment figures suggest. Flat local employment growth alongside rising advertised pay for commodity infrastructure roles is consistent with a market where retention costs for even entry-tier IT functions are climbing faster than the broader economy, making outsourcing or managed-services arrangements for support and sysadmin functions more financially attractive than a year ago. Organizations should evaluate whether current infrastructure and help desk staffing models still make economic sense locally, or whether global sourcing \u2014 now offering $35-60/hour versus $130-180K domestic developer salaries per Illinois market data \u2014 warrants a formal build-vs-buy review this quarter.", "looking_ahead": [{"category": "Worth watching", "body": "Illinois's pay transparency law, now in effect statewide, removes negotiation flexibility on new postings. Expect advertised pay ranges for Champaign IT roles to become a more visible benchmarking tool for candidates comparing local offers against Chicago and remote opportunities."}, {"category": "Emerging pressure point", "body": "Illinois WARN filings from T-Mobile, Uber, and GoHealth in September released hundreds of workers statewide, though none are local to Champaign-Urbana. Watch whether displaced IT and support talent from these filings migrates into the Champaign candidate pool given the metro's comparatively tight 3.6% unemployment rate."}, {"category": "Potential inflection point", "body": "National data shows AI-driven wage acceleration concentrated in mid-level engineering and cybersecurity roles, while traditional network admin roles face compression. If that pattern reaches Champaign's flat-growth labor market, expect further divergence between Systems Administrator and Network Engineer pay trajectories already visible this month."}, {"category": "Early indicator", "body": "Illinois tech hiring grew 11% month-over-month in August statewide, concentrated in Chicago's AI sector. Monitor whether any spillover demand reaches University of Illinois-adjacent employers or regional healthcare and education IT functions, which anchor Champaign's local hiring base."}], "roles": [{"role": "Data Scientist", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 86331.5, "metro_p50": 97665.0, "metro_p75": 97752.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 148250.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "Systems Administrator", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 72135.75, "metro_p50": 88250.0, "metro_p75": 88250.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 101168.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "Network Engineer", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 78570.75, "metro_p50": 83200.0, "metro_p75": 93524.0, "metro_trend_direction": "stable", "metro_trend_magnitude": "stable", "national_p50": 114400.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "Software Engineer", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 94749.0, "metro_p50": 170000.0, "metro_p75": 173630.0, "metro_trend_direction": "stable", "metro_trend_magnitude": "stable", "national_p50": 153652.0, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}, {"role": "Help Desk/IT Support Specialist", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 48880.0, "metro_p50": 62705.2, "metro_p75": 66763.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 53644.0, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}, {"role": "Cybersecurity Analyst", "data_scope": "state_rollup", "metro_p25": 87500.0, "metro_p50": 102197.0, "metro_p75": 118050.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "moderate", "national_p50": 106790.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "IT Project Manager", "data_scope": "state_rollup", "metro_p25": 85061.5, "metro_p50": 119185.8, "metro_p75": 130019.0, "metro_trend_direction": "stable", "metro_trend_magnitude": "stable", "national_p50": 117530.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}], "industry_snapshot": [], "citations": [], "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.", "edition_label": "October 2026", "files": {"html": "champaign-urbana-il-msa/information-technology/2026-09.html", "pdf": "champaign-urbana-il-msa/information-technology/2026-09.pdf"}, "published_at": "2026-10-09T13:49:12.780558+00:00", "report_html_url": "https://reports.wagescape.com/archive/v1/editions/champaign-urbana-il-msa/information-technology/2026-09.html", "report_pdf_url": "https://reports.wagescape.com/archive/v1/editions/champaign-urbana-il-msa/information-technology/2026-09.pdf"}