{"schema_version": 1, "id": "kingsport-bristol-bristol-tn-va-msa/finance/2026-09", "product": "Labor Market Pulse", "metro": {"geography_id": 196, "label": "Kingsport-Bristol-Bristol, TN-VA MSA", "slug": "kingsport-bristol-bristol-tn-va-msa"}, "focus_area": {"key": "finance", "slug": "finance", "label": "Finance"}, "period": "2026-09", "public_after": "2026-09-01", "frozen_at": "2026-10-09T13:28:02.909471+00:00", "headline": "Kingsport finance pay splits: mid-career up, leadership down.", "headline_summary": "Senior Accountant advertised pay rose to $80,000 locally even as Controller pay fell to $100,000, a divergence against national medians of $87,731 and $113,754 that signals uneven scarcity across the finance career ladder.", "key_indicators": [{"label": "Metro unemployment rate", "value": "4.0%", "context": "Up from 3.3% in April-May 2026"}, {"label": "Tennessee job losses streak", "value": "8 months", "context": "Despite 3.4% statewide unemployment"}, {"label": "National Financial Activities job losses", "value": "-129,000", "context": "Since May 2025, led by insurance carriers"}, {"label": "F&A Talent Shortage Index", "value": "77%", "context": "Up from 2025 Talent Surplus of 108%"}], "takeaways": [{"headline": "Senior Accountant pay is outrunning the national market.", "body": "Metro median advertised pay for Senior Accountant sits at $80,000, up significantly, while the national figure of $87,731 holds stable. Local scarcity at this level appears to be closing the gap faster than broader market trends, a signal for retention budgeting before turnover forces the issue."}, {"headline": "Controller and FP&A Manager pay softness may be a pricing lag, not demand collapse.", "body": "Both roles show significant metro declines against flat-to-rising national medians, an unusual pattern given statewide reports of a CPA and accountant talent shortage. Treat this as a signal to benchmark against national data rather than assume local employer demand has genuinely cooled."}, {"headline": "Automation is reshaping where finance headcount actually goes.", "body": "Regional banks and financial services firms are shifting loan processing and fraud detection to automated systems, consistent with national trends of F&A functions scaling without proportional headcount growth. Headcount planning should distinguish between roles facing genuine scarcity and roles facing structural displacement."}, {"headline": "Credit Analyst pay is diverging sharply from national demand.", "body": "Metro median fell significantly to $53,750 against a national median of $71,758 that is up moderately, a gap wide enough to suggest this role is being deprioritized or absorbed into automated underwriting locally while remaining competitive nationally."}], "local_conditions": "Kingsport-Bristol employment held near 131,500 through August with unemployment ticking up to 4.0% in June from 3.3% in spring, a softening consistent with Tennessee's eighth straight month of statewide job losses rather than a local shock. Manufacturing's 20,700-job base and ongoing automation of finance and back-office functions at regional banks are both compressing the traditional entry points for accounting and finance talent in this metro.", "implications": "Metro Controller and FP&A Manager advertised pay have both dropped significantly while national medians hold flat or rise, a divergence that suggests local employers are either recalibrating against a thinner regional candidate pool or quietly consolidating senior finance roles into shared-services structures. Meanwhile Senior Accountant and Tax Specialist pay are up sharply locally, pointing to acute scarcity at the mid-career level even as leadership-tier roles soften. Consider reviewing Controller and FP&A Manager compensation bands against national rather than metro-only data before assuming local softness reflects reduced demand rather than a pricing lag.", "looking_ahead": [{"category": "Worth watching", "body": "Tennessee has now shed jobs for eight consecutive months even as unemployment holds at 3.4%. Watch whether the Kingsport metro's June uptick to 4.0% unemployment extends into a sustained trend when July and August metro data post."}, {"category": "Expected", "body": "National Financial Activities employment has lost 129,000 jobs since May 2025, concentrated in insurance carriers. Confirm whether any regional insurance or back-office employers appear in upcoming Tennessee WARN filings."}, {"category": "Emerging pressure point", "body": "National F&A leaders report a 2026 Talent Shortage Index of 77%, reversing last year's surplus, alongside nearly half expecting direct labor rate increases above 4%. Local Senior Accountant and Tax Specialist pay gains suggest this shortage is already reaching Kingsport."}, {"category": "Potential inflection point", "body": "September's national average hourly earnings growth decelerated to 3.0% year-over-year, below forecast, easing aggregate wage budget pressure. Determine whether this national cooling reaches metro-level advertised pay for Controller and FP&A roles currently priced well below national medians."}], "roles": [{"role": "Controller", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 92500.0, "metro_p50": 100000.0, "metro_p75": 114200.0, "metro_trend_direction": "down", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 113754.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "Senior Accountant", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 79794.25, "metro_p50": 80000.0, "metro_p75": 80000.0, "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": 66841.0, "metro_p50": 73999.0, "metro_p75": 75882.0, "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": 34555.25, "metro_p50": 40034.0, "metro_p75": 40264.25, "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": 33280.0, "metro_p50": 39520.0, "metro_p75": 39870.0, "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": "metro", "metro_p25": 52500.0, "metro_p50": 53750.0, "metro_p75": 53750.0, "metro_trend_direction": "down", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 71758.0, "national_trend_direction": "up", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "FP&A Manager", "data_scope": "state_rollup", "metro_p25": 83283.0, "metro_p50": 102307.6, "metro_p75": 123633.0, "metro_trend_direction": "down", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "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": "kingsport-bristol-bristol-tn-va-msa/finance/2026-09.html", "pdf": "kingsport-bristol-bristol-tn-va-msa/finance/2026-09.pdf"}, "published_at": "2026-10-09T13:52:09.381500+00:00", "report_html_url": "https://reports.wagescape.com/archive/v1/editions/kingsport-bristol-bristol-tn-va-msa/finance/2026-09.html", "report_pdf_url": "https://reports.wagescape.com/archive/v1/editions/kingsport-bristol-bristol-tn-va-msa/finance/2026-09.pdf"}