Sources & References
Metro Job Market Pulse · Manhattan, KS MSA · October 2026
Every advertised-pay, job-posting and industry figure in this briefing comes from WageScape's own database of active job postings. The sources below back the external facts cited in the written analysis.
Sources cited in this report
Key Indicators
Manhattan MSA preliminary unemployment at 4.5% for August 2026
Kansas Department of Labor — Preliminary metro-level unemployment estimate
Kansas statewide unemployment held at 3.8% in August 2026
Bureau of Labor Statistics / FRED — Seasonally adjusted state unemployment series
This Month's Takeaways
National nonfarm payrolls rose just 29,000 in September, below 84,000 forecast
Bureau of Labor Statistics — September 2026 national jobs report
Local Economic Conditions
Riley County unemployment rose from 2.9% (April) to 4.3% (July 2026)
Little Apple Post / Kansas Department of Labor — Local news reporting of KDOL county unemployment data
Looking Ahead
Zero Kansas WARN notices filed in trailing 90 days as of Sept 25, 2026
Kansas WARN Database — State WARN Act notice tracking
Kansas labor force participation at 67.4% vs U.S. 61.8% (April 2026)
Bureau of Labor Statistics — State and national labor force participation comparison
How the numbers are calculated
- Advertised pay is the median of the pay ranges employers publish in active job postings in this metro. It is not survey or payroll data.
- Percent changes compare the latest six full months with the six months before that, for the same metro and sector.
- Sectors group postings by the employer's industry (NAICS) classification into ten sectors. Where a metro has too few postings in a sector, the state figure is used instead.
- Role pay trends use the same comparison windows. "Stable" means a change of less than 3%; "moderate" 3–10%; "significant" more than 10%.
Official data for comparison