{"schema_version": 1, "id": "iowa-city-ia-msa/information-technology/2026-10", "product": "Labor Market Pulse", "metro": {"geography_id": 262, "label": "Iowa City, IA MSA", "slug": "iowa-city-ia-msa"}, "focus_area": {"key": "information_technology", "slug": "information-technology", "label": "Information Technology"}, "period": "2026-10", "public_after": "2026-10-01", "frozen_at": "2026-11-03T03:12:25.000683+00:00", "headline": "Iowa City IT pay splits: engineers surge, support roles slide.", "headline_summary": "Metro Software Engineer pay hit $167,000 against a national median of $154,403, while Systems Administrator and Help Desk pay both fell even as national figures for those roles moved in the opposite direction.", "key_indicators": [{"label": "Johnson County unemployment", "value": "3.0%", "context": "vs 4.2% U.S., Aug 2026"}, {"label": "Iowa City MSA labor force", "value": "~102.5K", "context": "down from 103.9K peak, Feb 2026"}, {"label": "Software Engineer advertised pay, metro", "value": "$167,000", "context": "vs $154,403 national median"}, {"label": "Iowa tech employment growth, 2026", "value": "1.5%", "context": "vs 1.9% national (CompTIA)"}], "takeaways": [{"headline": "Local software engineering pay has outrun the national market.", "body": "Metro median advertised pay of $167,000 sits above the $154,403 national figure even as national growth holds stable, suggesting Iowa City employers are competing hard for a thin local bench. Budgeting against national benchmarks alone risks underpricing this role locally."}, {"headline": "Systems Administrator pay is falling locally while rising nationally.", "body": "Metro median pay dropped to $76,269 (moderate decline) against a national median of $102,503 that is climbing moderately upward \u2014 a widening gap that may reflect softer local demand for traditional on-prem administration or employers routing this work toward managed services. Worth testing against actual retention data before assuming the role is simply overpriced elsewhere."}, {"headline": "Cybersecurity and network roles show the clearest signs of sustained demand.", "body": "Cybersecurity Analyst ($108,169) and Network Engineer ($119,624) pay both moved up significantly locally, tracking national gains in IT systems and solutions wages (+4.7% per BLS) and TAI's stated policy focus on cybersecurity and infrastructure. These look like structural pay floors, and should be benchmarked against current demand trends."}, {"headline": "Help desk pay erosion may signal where outsourcing pressure concentrates first.", "body": "Metro Help Desk/IT Support pay fell to $45,303, below the already-declining $53,129 national median, consistent with national reporting that 41% of technologists would trade salary for remote flexibility \u2014 a dynamic that enables routing frontline support to lower-cost or offshore capacity. Local leaders weighing build-vs-buy on tier-1 support have real pay-compression evidence to act on."}], "local_conditions": "Johnson County's 3.0% unemployment rate and a labor force that has shrunk from 103.9 thousand in February to roughly 102.5 thousand by midyear point to a metro constrained by worker supply, even as it posted the fastest job growth among Iowa metros at 0.9% annually. University of Iowa and healthcare anchor employment while statewide labor force participation erodes toward 66.9%, tightening the pool available for infrastructure, security, and support hiring even where budgets exist.", "implications": "Shrinking local labor supply collides with a national bifurcation in tech pay \u2014 AI and infrastructure specialists commanding double-digit premiums while generalist and support roles soften \u2014 forcing Iowa City employers to decide where scarce compensation dollars create the most retention value. Metro Software Engineer pay at $167,000 (above the $154,403 national median) and Network Engineer pay climbing to $119,624 suggest local employers are already paying up for build-and-maintain talent to avoid vacancy risk in a labor pool too thin to backfill quickly. Consider reviewing whether current infrastructure and security headcount plans assume a depth of local candidates that the shrinking Johnson County labor force can no longer reliably supply.", "looking_ahead": [{"category": "Expected", "body": "Johnson County's August unemployment reading of 3.0% should be followed by a September/October update from Iowa Workforce Development; a continued uptick would confirm labor supply as the binding constraint on IT headcount planning."}, {"category": "Emerging pressure point", "body": "Statewide labor force participation has fallen to 66.9% from 67.8% a year ago on retirements and return-to-education flows; watch whether this accelerates the loss of experienced infrastructure and sysadmin talent locally, raising the cost of retention relative to replacement."}, {"category": "Worth watching", "body": "Wells Fargo's 86-person West Des Moines layoff and broader Iowa WARN activity (96 notices, 3,304 workers in 2026) remain concentrated outside Johnson County; monitor whether any released technology or financial-services talent begins surfacing in the Iowa City candidate pool."}, {"category": "Potential inflection point", "body": "National tech layoffs have already exceeded 133,000 workers through late October, well above all of 2025, while data center and infrastructure postings grew 20% in three months. If that national reallocation reaches secondary markets like Iowa City, expect increased competition for network and systems talent even as support-role pay continues to soften."}], "roles": [{"role": "Data Scientist", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 98728.0, "metro_p50": 123343.6, "metro_p75": 123714.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 145881.0, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}, {"role": "Systems Administrator", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 68678.0, "metro_p50": 76269.0, "metro_p75": 80784.5, "metro_trend_direction": "down", "metro_trend_magnitude": "moderate", "national_p50": 102503.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "Network Engineer", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 89251.0, "metro_p50": 119624.0, "metro_p75": 119804.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 115757.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "Software Engineer", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 123989.0, "metro_p50": 167000.0, "metro_p75": 170000.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 154403.0, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}, {"role": "Help Desk/IT Support Specialist", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 34870.5, "metro_p50": 45303.0, "metro_p75": 47258.0, "metro_trend_direction": "down", "metro_trend_magnitude": "moderate", "national_p50": 53129.0, "national_trend_direction": "down", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "Cybersecurity Analyst", "data_scope": "state_rollup", "metro_p25": 78777.5, "metro_p50": 108169.0, "metro_p75": 124593.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 107327.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "IT Project Manager", "data_scope": "state_rollup", "metro_p25": 77900.25, "metro_p50": 116839.4, "metro_p75": 129108.5, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "moderate", "national_p50": 118149.8, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}], "industry_snapshot": [], "citations": [{"source_name": "Iowa Workforce Development / BLS LAUS", "source_url": null, "statement": "Johnson County unemployment rate at 3.0% in August 2026"}, {"source_name": "U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics", "source_url": null, "statement": "Iowa City MSA labor force decline from 103.9K to 101.8K-102.5K"}, {"source_name": "Iowa Workforce Development", "source_url": null, "statement": "Iowa labor force participation fell to 66.9% from 67.8%"}, {"source_name": "Bureau of Labor Statistics", "source_url": null, "statement": "IT systems & solutions wages up 4.7% year-over-year nationally"}, {"source_name": "Layoffs.fyi / industry tracking", "source_url": null, "statement": "Tech layoffs exceeded 133,000 workers through October 21, 2026"}, {"source_name": "Indeed Hiring Lab", "source_url": null, "statement": "Data center job postings grew 20% over three months nationally"}], "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": "November 2026", "files": {"html": "iowa-city-ia-msa/information-technology/2026-10.html", "pdf": "iowa-city-ia-msa/information-technology/2026-10.pdf"}, "published_at": "2026-11-03T08:23:35.982027+00:00", "report_html_url": "https://reports.wagescape.com/archive/v1/editions/iowa-city-ia-msa/information-technology/2026-10.html", "report_pdf_url": "https://reports.wagescape.com/archive/v1/editions/iowa-city-ia-msa/information-technology/2026-10.pdf"}