{"schema_version": 1, "id": "colorado-springs-co-msa/finance/2026-08", "product": "Labor Market Pulse", "metro": {"geography_id": 125, "label": "Colorado Springs, CO MSA", "slug": "colorado-springs-co-msa"}, "focus_area": {"key": "finance", "slug": "finance", "label": "Finance"}, "period": "2026-08", "public_after": "2026-08-01", "frozen_at": "2026-10-09T16:25:01.723507+00:00", "headline": "Colorado Springs Financial Analyst pay outruns the nation by 31%.", "headline_summary": "Metro Financial Analyst pay hit $108,375 versus $82,905 nationally as El Paso County unemployment climbed to 4.1% and Colorado's labor force participation fell to a 10-year low of 65.3%.", "key_indicators": [{"label": "El Paso County unemployment", "value": "4.1%", "context": "Up from 3.8% in May 2026"}, {"label": "Financial Analyst advertised pay, metro", "value": "$108,375", "context": "vs $82,905 national median"}, {"label": "Colorado labor force participation", "value": "65.3%", "context": "10-year low, down from 65.5% in July"}, {"label": "Colorado Springs average hourly wage", "value": "$34.03", "context": "vs $33.54 national average"}], "takeaways": [{"headline": "Financial Analyst pay has decoupled from the national market.", "body": "Metro median advertised pay of $108,375 sits nearly 31% above the national figure of $82,905, a gap too large to attribute to cost of living alone. Compensation bands anchored to national data risk understating what it now takes to fill this role locally."}, {"headline": "Controller pay is softening while everything else moves up.", "body": "Metro Controller median has drifted down to $115,000 even as Senior Accountant, Tax Specialist, and Credit Analyst pay all rose. This divergence may reflect a smaller, more competitive pool of Controller openings rather than reduced demand for the role itself \u2014 worth confirming before assuming the market has cooled."}, {"headline": "Labor force participation decline is a supply story, not a demand story.", "body": "Colorado's participation rate fell to a 10-year low of 65.3% in August, even as job growth statewide turned negative. Finance leaders filling technical accounting or FP&A roles should expect longer time-to-fill regardless of budgeted headcount, since the constraint is candidates available, not roles open."}, {"headline": "Aerospace-adjacent wage pressure is bleeding into finance hiring.", "body": "Defense contractors and an expanding tech sector compete directly for the analytical and technical talent finance teams also need, particularly for FP&A and analyst-level roles. Budget cycles built on flat comp assumptions for these roles may understate real hiring cost in this metro specifically."}], "local_conditions": "El Paso County's unemployment rate held at 4.1% in August, tracking the state's climb to 4% and consistent with a labor market that has tightened modestly since spring, while Colorado's labor force participation rate fell to a 10-year low of 65.3% \u2014 a supply constraint that compounds hiring difficulty even as headline job growth softens. Aerospace and defense contracting, alongside a fast-growing tech sector (Colorado Springs ranks No. 2 nationally for tech talent growth), continue to anchor wage pressure in a metro where average hourly wages already exceed the national figure by roughly $0.50.", "implications": "Financial Analyst pay in Colorado Springs has moved up significantly (metro median $108,375 versus $82,905 nationally), a gap wide enough to signal that FP&A and forecasting talent is being bid up locally, likely reflecting defense-sector and tech-adjacent demand competing for the same analytical skill set Finance departments need for close automation and modeling. Statewide financial activities added jobs even as overall Colorado payrolls contracted in August, suggesting finance functions are being asked to do more with headcount that is harder to source and costlier to retain. Consider reviewing whether current FP&A and analyst compensation bands reflect this local premium before budget cycles lock in assumptions built on national benchmarks.", "looking_ahead": [{"category": "Worth watching", "body": "El Paso County unemployment has ticked from 3.8% in May to 4.1% in August \u2014 watch whether this stabilizes or continues climbing toward the state's 4.0% mark, which would signal a genuine loosening in candidate availability for finance roles."}, {"category": "Emerging pressure point", "body": "Colorado's labor force participation rate hit a 10-year low; if this trend persists into Q4, expect continued upward pressure on advertised pay for scarce skill sets like FP&A and technical accounting, independent of any softening in headline unemployment."}, {"category": "Potential inflection point", "body": "Statewide professional and business services contracted by 800 jobs in the 2026 forecast period. Watch whether outsourced finance and accounting service costs shift as this sector softens, particularly for firms relying on contract or interim finance talent."}, {"category": "Early indicator", "body": "Colorado WARN notices are down 11% year-over-year with aerospace and defense among the most-affected industries; a reversal or acceleration in defense-sector layoffs would be a leading signal for finance and FP&A candidate supply given how tightly that talent pool overlaps with Colorado Springs' core industry."}], "roles": [{"role": "Controller", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 92500.0, "metro_p50": 115000.0, "metro_p75": 125000.0, "metro_trend_direction": "down", "metro_trend_magnitude": "moderate", "national_p50": 112500.0, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}, {"role": "Senior Accountant", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 75062.5, "metro_p50": 87466.0, "metro_p75": 89108.25, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "moderate", "national_p50": 87731.0, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}, {"role": "Financial Analyst", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 81644.0, "metro_p50": 108375.0, "metro_p75": 113886.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 82905.0, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}, {"role": "Billing Specialist", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 42442.0, "metro_p50": 47000.0, "metro_p75": 52000.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 49700.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "Tax Specialist", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 52884.0, "metro_p50": 70000.0, "metro_p75": 77500.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 66725.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "significant"}, {"role": "Credit Analyst", "data_scope": "state_rollup", "metro_p25": 58308.0, "metro_p50": 72350.0, "metro_p75": 79801.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "moderate", "national_p50": 72000.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "FP&A Manager", "data_scope": "state_rollup", "metro_p25": 102500.0, "metro_p50": 127805.2, "metro_p75": 137525.0, "metro_trend_direction": "stable", "metro_trend_magnitude": "stable", "national_p50": 127341.0, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}], "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": "September 2026", "files": {"html": "colorado-springs-co-msa/finance/2026-08.html", "pdf": "colorado-springs-co-msa/finance/2026-08.pdf"}, "published_at": "2026-10-09T16:33:37.397635+00:00", "report_html_url": "https://reports.wagescape.com/archive/v1/editions/colorado-springs-co-msa/finance/2026-08.html", "report_pdf_url": "https://reports.wagescape.com/archive/v1/editions/colorado-springs-co-msa/finance/2026-08.pdf"}