{"schema_version": 1, "id": "great-falls-mt-msa/finance/2026-09", "product": "Labor Market Pulse", "metro": {"geography_id": 185, "label": "Great Falls, MT MSA", "slug": "great-falls-mt-msa"}, "focus_area": {"key": "finance", "slug": "finance", "label": "Finance"}, "period": "2026-09", "public_after": "2026-09-01", "frozen_at": "2026-10-09T13:27:26.405920+00:00", "headline": "Great Falls Finance pay splits sharply from national trends.", "headline_summary": "Senior Accountant pay in Great Falls has climbed to $88,400 against a flat $87,731 nationally, even as national financial-activities employment keeps contracting and FP&A Manager pay softens locally.", "key_indicators": [{"label": "Cascade County unemployment", "value": "3.0%-3.4%", "context": "Range across May-July 2026; Montana statewide at 3.2%"}, {"label": "Montana 2025 wage growth", "value": "5.4%", "context": "vs 3.4% national; Montana ranked #1 among states"}, {"label": "National financial activities jobs lost", "value": "129,000", "context": "Since May 2025, concentrated in insurance carriers"}, {"label": "National wage growth deceleration", "value": "3.0% y/y", "context": "September reading below 3.2% economist forecast"}], "takeaways": [{"headline": "Controller pay is moving sharply locally while the national rate just drifts.", "body": "Advertised Controller pay in Great Falls is up significantly this month even as the national median moves only moderately, a divergence that may reflect a thin local bench for mid-career finance leadership rather than a broad market shift. Budget assumptions built on national Controller benchmarks risk understating what it takes to fill this role locally."}, {"headline": "Senior Accountant pay in Great Falls now rivals the national rate.", "body": "Metro median advertised pay for Senior Accountant ($88,400) has moved up significantly and sits above the stable national figure ($87,731), an unusual inversion for a small metro. This is consistent with the CPA and accountant shortage flagged nationally (2026 Talent Shortage Index of 77%, up from a 2025 surplus) showing up acutely in a labor market this size."}, {"headline": "FP&A Manager pay is softening locally against a flat national trend.", "body": "Metro median FP&A Manager pay is down moderately this month while the national figure holds stable, a divergence worth flagging before assuming local demand for analytical finance talent is cooling broadly. Could reflect a single large employer's hiring cycle completing rather than a structural shift in demand."}, {"headline": "Automation is quietly reshaping what headcount growth actually buys.", "body": "National F&A leaders report aggressive permanent headcount plans (74% increasing headcount) alongside heavier reliance on automation and shared services to scale without proportional staffing growth. Great Falls Finance teams planning headcount should weigh whether incremental roles are better filled through automation investment given the area's limited talent supply."}], "local_conditions": "Cascade County unemployment held near 3.0%-3.4% through mid-2026, consistent with a twelfth straight month of sub-3% readings statewide, even as Montana's broader labor force growth stalled and employment fell for the first year since 2020. Great Falls' economic base \u2014 anchored by Malmstrom Air Force Base, federal civilian employment, and a modest finance and insurance sector averaging $79,620 annually \u2014 leaves local Finance hiring more exposed to national financial-activities contraction (-129,000 jobs since May 2025) than to local demand softness.", "implications": "National financial-activities job losses are concentrated in insurance carriers and related services, not core corporate finance functions, but Great Falls' thin local talent pool means any national pullback in hiring budgets translates quickly into fewer qualified local candidates willing to switch jobs. Montana's 5.4% statewide wage growth in 2025 \u2014 more than 2 points above the national rate \u2014 suggests local Finance teams are still competing against broader labor scarcity even as national average hourly earnings growth decelerates to 3.0% y/y, creating a gap between what national surveys imply and what local offers require. Consider reviewing whether current budget assumptions for Finance headcount costs reflect Montana's wage trajectory rather than the national deceleration story.", "looking_ahead": [{"category": "Expected release", "body": "BLS metro-level data for Great Falls MSA covering September is due October 20, 2026, and will clarify whether the county's modest unemployment uptick (2.9% to 3.4% across spring/summer) is stabilizing or trending upward."}, {"category": "Worth watching", "body": "National financial-activities job losses have run for sixteen straight months; watch whether any regional or remote-eligible roles tied to larger institutions start surfacing as local WARN filings, which currently show only 4 notices statewide affecting 173 workers."}, {"category": "Emerging pressure point", "body": "Montana's wage growth lead (5.4% statewide in 2025) against national deceleration (3.0% y/y in September) may widen the gap between locally advertised Finance pay and national salary planning assumptions, particularly for roles like Controller and Senior Accountant already showing sharp local movement."}, {"category": "Potential inflection point", "body": "Sibanye-Stillwater layoffs in eastern Montana mining operations could release finance and accounting talent into the broader state labor pool; watch whether any of that talent surfaces in Cascade County applicant flow over the next two months."}], "roles": [{"role": "Controller", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 44989.0, "metro_p50": 61855.2, "metro_p75": 66838.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 113754.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "Senior Accountant", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 65852.0, "metro_p50": 88400.0, "metro_p75": 94380.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 87731.0, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}, {"role": "Financial Analyst", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 65752.0, "metro_p50": 78976.0, "metro_p75": 79021.0, "metro_trend_direction": "stable", "metro_trend_magnitude": "stable", "national_p50": 94782.0, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}, {"role": "Billing Specialist", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 36785.0, "metro_p50": 51805.2, "metro_p75": 72800.0, "metro_trend_direction": "stable", "metro_trend_magnitude": "stable", "national_p50": 49512.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "Tax Specialist", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 41586.0, "metro_p50": 58588.0, "metro_p75": 58588.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 65842.4, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "significant"}, {"role": "Credit Analyst", "data_scope": "state_rollup", "metro_p25": 53029.25, "metro_p50": 65000.0, "metro_p75": 71820.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "moderate", "national_p50": 71758.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "FP&A Manager", "data_scope": "state_rollup", "metro_p25": 97991.0, "metro_p50": 125784.0, "metro_p75": 139846.0, "metro_trend_direction": "down", "metro_trend_magnitude": "moderate", "national_p50": 128139.0, "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": "October 2026", "files": {"html": "great-falls-mt-msa/finance/2026-09.html", "pdf": "great-falls-mt-msa/finance/2026-09.pdf"}, "published_at": "2026-10-09T13:51:02.436700+00:00", "report_html_url": "https://reports.wagescape.com/archive/v1/editions/great-falls-mt-msa/finance/2026-09.html", "report_pdf_url": "https://reports.wagescape.com/archive/v1/editions/great-falls-mt-msa/finance/2026-09.pdf"}