{"schema_version": 1, "id": "nd-nonmetropolitan-area/restaurant-industry/2026-10", "product": "Labor Market Pulse", "metro": {"geography_id": 268, "label": "ND NONMETROPOLITAN AREA", "slug": "nd-nonmetropolitan-area"}, "focus_area": {"key": "restaurant_industry", "slug": "restaurant-industry", "label": "Restaurant Industry"}, "period": "2026-10", "public_after": "2026-10-01", "frozen_at": "2026-11-03T06:53:46.390791+00:00", "headline": "North Dakota restaurants chase workers in the tightest labor pool in the U.S.", "headline_summary": "Food service accounts for nearly 9% of North Dakota's job openings against 2.2% statewide unemployment, while metro Assistant Restaurant Manager pay jumped to a $50,000 median even as General Manager pay slipped to $58,592.", "key_indicators": [{"label": "ND statewide unemployment", "value": "2.2%", "context": "2nd-lowest in U.S., behind only South Dakota"}, {"label": "Food service share of job openings", "value": "~9%", "context": "vs industry's smaller share of total employment"}, {"label": "Leisure & hospitality weekly wage", "value": "$480", "context": "Lowest of any ND sector tracked by BLS"}, {"label": "Statewide open positions", "value": "12,000+", "context": "Against ~4,000 new jobs created annually"}], "takeaways": [{"headline": "Food service vacancies are outsized relative to the labor pool.", "body": "Restaurant openings make up close to 9% of North Dakota's job postings against 2.2% statewide unemployment, meaning there are simply not enough available workers to fill rural kitchen and service roles through conventional hiring. Retention investment is the more defensible budget line this quarter."}, {"headline": "Assistant manager pay is climbing while top-of-house pay slips.", "body": "Metro Assistant Restaurant Manager advertised pay rose to a $50,000 median, a significant jump against a stable $39,211 national figure, while Restaurant Manager/General Manager pay in the metro moved down moderately to $58,592. Compression between these two tiers may signal operators are promoting from within to fill scarce GM-level roles."}, {"headline": "Tipped-wage deregulation lands in an already wage-starved FOH market.", "body": "DOL's withdrawal of the 80/20 rule lets operators lean on the $2.13 tipped-wage floor for more side work nationally, but North Dakota's leisure and hospitality weekly wage already sits lowest of any tracked sector at $480. Stretching tipped-wage flexibility here carries more retention risk than in looser labor markets."}, {"headline": "BOH wage pressure reflects structural demand.", "body": "National prep cook demand is up 41% year-over-year as operators rebuild kitchens cut during 2023-2024, and BLS projects 12% growth in cook employment through 2035 against just 2% for servers. Line Cook advertised pay in the metro is holding flat at $35,360, a gap against rising demand that compensation strategy should not ignore."}], "local_conditions": "North Dakota's nonmetropolitan labor market remains historically tight, with statewide unemployment at 2.2% in September and food service accounting for nearly 9% of all open positions statewide \u2014 a disproportionate share for an industry that employs a fraction of the workforce. Leisure and hospitality carries the lowest average weekly wage of any sector tracked by the state at $480, meaning rural restaurant operators are competing for workers against construction and energy employers paying multiples of that figure.", "implications": "Scarcity this severe shifts the central question from hiring to retention \u2014 with statewide restaurant turnover tracking toward the national 80% figure, every departure now carries a replacement cost compounded by alcohol-training onboarding requirements that must be completed within 30 days of hire. Elimination of the federal 80/20 tipped-wage rule gives operators more flexibility to assign side work without triggering full minimum-wage obligations, but in a market this tight that flexibility risks accelerating front-of-house attrition if base cash compensation falls further behind competing sectors. Consider evaluating whether side-work scheduling changes under the new tipped-wage guidance could undercut retention gains made elsewhere in total rewards.", "looking_ahead": [{"category": "Early indicator", "body": "Watch whether Assistant Restaurant Manager pay growth (+significant locally) continues into November, which would reinforce a within-market promotion strategy for GM-level roles."}, {"category": "Emerging pressure point", "body": "Track how operators apply the newly deregulated tipped-wage rules to side work; wage compression at the FOH level could accelerate turnover already running near 80% annually."}, {"category": "Potential inflection point", "body": "North Dakota's proposed Department of Workforce Development could bring targeted hospitality workforce funding; its first actions over the next 60 days are worth monitoring for restaurant-specific relevance."}, {"category": "Worth watching", "body": "County-level wage data (next update expected with November BLS releases) should clarify whether Cass and Burleigh County restaurant job ads \u2014 a signal of hiring demand, with each ad often covering several openings \u2014 are translating into wage movement or persistent vacancy."}], "roles": [{"role": "Assistant Restaurant Manager", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 40664.0, "metro_p50": 50000.0, "metro_p75": 50960.0, "metro_trend_direction": "up", "metro_trend_magnitude": "significant", "national_p50": 39211.0, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}, {"role": "Catering Manager", "data_scope": "state_rollup", "metro_p25": 45240.0, "metro_p50": 51975.2, "metro_p75": 60320.0, "metro_trend_direction": "down", "metro_trend_magnitude": "moderate", "national_p50": 50076.0, "national_trend_direction": "down", "national_trend_magnitude": "moderate"}, {"role": "Crew", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 25988.0, "metro_p50": 30160.0, "metro_p75": 32760.0, "metro_trend_direction": "down", "metro_trend_magnitude": "moderate", "national_p50": 30066.0, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}, {"role": "Line Cook", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 31604.0, "metro_p50": 35360.0, "metro_p75": 37960.0, "metro_trend_direction": "stable", "metro_trend_magnitude": "stable", "national_p50": 37421.4, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}, {"role": "Restaurant Manager/General Manager", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 50960.0, "metro_p50": 58592.0, "metro_p75": 75000.0, "metro_trend_direction": "down", "metro_trend_magnitude": "moderate", "national_p50": 59724.0, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}, {"role": "Server", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 29611.25, "metro_p50": 35277.0, "metro_p75": 41600.0, "metro_trend_direction": "stable", "metro_trend_magnitude": "stable", "national_p50": 35024.0, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}, {"role": "Shift Manager", "data_scope": "metro", "metro_p25": 28318.5, "metro_p50": 32760.0, "metro_p75": 35360.0, "metro_trend_direction": "stable", "metro_trend_magnitude": "stable", "national_p50": 33024.0, "national_trend_direction": "stable", "national_trend_magnitude": "stable"}], "industry_snapshot": [], "citations": [{"source_name": "Job Service North Dakota", "source_url": null, "statement": "Food service represents nearly 9% of all North Dakota job openings"}, {"source_name": "Bureau of Labor Statistics", "source_url": null, "statement": "Leisure and hospitality has lowest average weekly wage among ND sectors at $480"}, {"source_name": "U.S. Department of Labor", "source_url": null, "statement": "DOL withdrew the 80/20 tipped-wage rule in October 2026"}, {"source_name": "National Restaurant Association / industry labor tracking", "source_url": null, "statement": "National restaurant turnover near 80% annually, prep cook demand up 41% YoY"}, {"source_name": "Bureau of Labor Statistics", "source_url": null, "statement": "North Dakota unemployment at 2.2%, second-lowest among states"}, {"source_name": "Job Service North Dakota", "source_url": null, "statement": "North Dakota has over 12,000 open positions statewide"}], "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": "nd-nonmetropolitan-area/restaurant-industry/2026-10.html", "pdf": "nd-nonmetropolitan-area/restaurant-industry/2026-10.pdf"}, "published_at": "2026-11-03T08:26:59.693843+00:00", "report_html_url": "https://reports.wagescape.com/archive/v1/editions/nd-nonmetropolitan-area/restaurant-industry/2026-10.html", "report_pdf_url": "https://reports.wagescape.com/archive/v1/editions/nd-nonmetropolitan-area/restaurant-industry/2026-10.pdf"}