Rural PA's labor market splits along county and sector lines.
3.6%
Wayne County unemployment
vs 4.7% Scranton-Wilkes-Barre, same month
36,000 jobs
PA statewide job growth since Aug 2025
concentrated in health/education, leisure/hospitality
-13,900 jobs
PA government/construction job losses
since August 2025, statewide
4.1%
PA statewide unemployment rate
up from 3.7% in August; 29th month at/below US rate
This Month's Takeaways
01
Nonmetro PA is not one labor market — it is several.
Wayne County's 3.6% unemployment sits well below Scranton-Wilkes-Barre's 4.7%, a gap wide enough that statewide averages mask real divergence in county-level business conditions. Commerce leaders should treat county-level data, not statewide figures, as the relevant baseline for assessing local momentum.
02
Health care and leisure are carrying statewide job growth, not rural goods sectors.
The 36,000 jobs Pennsylvania added since August 2025 are concentrated in health/education and hospitality, sectors less dominant in many rural counties than construction, government, and logistics — all of which lost ground statewide. A county's industry mix, more than its headline unemployment rate, now determines whether it's riding the growth or missing it.
03
Freight and skilled trades pay is rising while lower-wage logistics roles soften.
Local CDL driver pay rose to $83,590 (up moderately) even as warehouse/fulfillment advertised pay fell to $36,400, suggesting demand is bifurcating toward licensed, scarce skill sets rather than broad-based logistics sector strength. This divergence is a more reliable read on sector health than aggregate warehousing employment counts alone.
04
Government and construction softness is a structural watch item, not noise.
Both sectors remain below year-ago employment levels statewide, and nonmetro counties typically carry a higher public-sector employment share than metro Pennsylvania. Public-sector stability — a core gauge of local economic resilience in rural counties — bears closer tracking than the topline unemployment rate suggests.
Local Economic Conditions
Pennsylvania's nonmetropolitan counties show a wider gap between tighter rural labor markets (Wayne County at 3.6% unemployment in July) and softer micro-areas like Scranton-Wilkes-Barre at 4.7%, with statewide job growth concentrated almost entirely in health care and leisure/hospitality rather than the goods-producing and public-sector work that anchors many rural county economies. Construction and government employment across Pennsylvania remain below year-ago levels, a pattern likely to weigh more heavily on nonmetro counties where those two sectors make up a larger share of total payrolls than in urban metros.
Open Threads in the Data
Uneven sector performance across the rural "T" counties suggests local business climate conditions depend heavily on which supersectors dominate a given county's base — commerce leaders in counties anchored by construction, logistics or government may be watching a cooling climate while those with strong health/education presence see more resilient activity. Advertised pay softness in warehouse/fulfillment ($36,400, down moderately) and manufacturing production roles ($37,090, down moderately) locally, against stable-to-rising CDL driver pay ($83,590, up moderately), points to continued strength in freight/logistics demand even as broader goods-producing employment softens. Current conditions suggest economic development leaders track which supersectors are expanding versus contracting at the county level before characterizing the regional outlook as uniformly strong or weak.
Advertised Pay Indicators · WageScape Benchmark 25 Jobs
Job postings data for the PA NONMETROPOLITAN AREA metro — median advertised pay, its recent trend, and the number of active postings behind each figure. Jobs are grouped for readability and are not the same as the 10 sector classifications on the next page. For additional job detail contact WageScape.
Retail Trade
| Retail Sales Associate |
$27,386 |
↓ Moderate decline |
14,281 |
| Retail Cashier |
$28,547 |
→ Stable |
3,474 |
Transportation & Warehousing
| Warehouse/Fulfillment Associate |
$36,400 |
↓ Moderate decline |
2,746 |
| CDL Truck Driver |
$83,590 |
↑ Moderate increase |
27,499 |
| Delivery Driver |
$32,798 |
↓ Moderate decline |
14,507 |
| Warehouse Manager |
$72,500 |
↑ Moderate increase |
11 |
Construction
| Construction Laborer |
$37,440 |
→ Stable |
1,285 |
Construction/Skilled Trades
| Electrician |
$67,402 |
↑ Significant increase |
2,115 |
| HVAC Technician |
$65,520 |
↑ Significant increase |
485 |
Manufacturing
| Manufacturing Production Worker/Assembler |
$37,090 |
↓ Moderate decline |
2,750 |
Cross-Sector
| Customer Service Representative |
$37,435 |
→ Stable |
1,910 |
| Operations Manager |
$72,381 |
↓ Moderate decline |
27 |
Leisure & Hospitality
| Food Service Worker |
$29,282 |
↓ Moderate decline |
992 |
Healthcare
| Certified Nursing Assistant / Home Health Aide |
$41,740 |
→ Stable |
12,285 |
| Registered Nurse |
$99,133 |
↑ Significant increase |
19,580 |
Admin/Office Support
| Administrative Assistant/Office Clerk |
$38,404 |
→ Stable |
2,231 |
Information/Technology
| Software Engineer |
$137,679 |
↓ Moderate decline |
1,814 |
| Data Engineer |
$123,472 |
↓ Moderate decline |
814 |
Professional & Business Services
| Accountant |
$66,167 |
→ Stable |
1,283 |
| HR Generalist/Manager |
$67,850 |
→ Stable |
425 |
| Marketing Specialist |
$60,000 |
↑ Moderate increase |
190 |
| Business Analyst |
$91,584 |
↓ Moderate decline |
715 |
Finance & Insurance
| Financial Analyst |
$87,820 |
→ Stable |
383 |
Government/Education
| Elementary/Secondary School Teacher |
$52,080 |
↑ Significant increase |
8,810 |
Cross-Sector Sales
| Account Manager |
$81,460 |
→ Stable |
1,587 |
Industry Snapshot · PA NONMETROPOLITAN AREA
Advertised pay and job-posting trends across the whole metro economy, rolled up by employer industry — not just the bellwether roles above.
| Sector |
Median Pay Change |
Job Postings Change |
| Construction |
↑ +4.0% |
↓ −45.8% |
| Manufacturing |
↑ +9.4% |
↓ −56.8% |
| Retail Trade |
→ +1.2% |
↓ −37.9% |
| Transportation, Warehousing & Utilities |
→ −0.4% |
↓ −14.7% |
| Information |
↓ −6.8% |
↓ −87.1% |
| Financial Activities |
↓ −11.1% |
↓ −76.4% |
| Professional & Business Services |
→ −2.6% |
↓ −54.0% |
| Education & Health Services |
→ +1.0% |
↓ −43.8% |
| Leisure & Hospitality |
↓ −6.8% |
↓ −39.0% |
| Government |
↑ +20.0% |
↓ −66.5% |
Looking Ahead · Next 30–60 Days
Data gap to monitor
No county-specific or nonmetro-area BLS release has yet been issued for September; the most current benchmark remains July data published September 1. Watch for the October release of August/September county figures to confirm whether Wayne County's tightness and Scranton-Wilkes-Barre's softness persisted.
Emerging pressure point
Statewide, government, construction, trade/transportation and information lost 13,900 jobs combined since August 2025 — sectors overrepresented in rural county payrolls relative to Philadelphia or Pittsburgh. A continuation would show up first in nonmetro county unemployment ticking upward relative to the state average.
Policy to track, not predict
Pennsylvania's House passed H.B. 2189 to raise the state's $7.25 minimum wage, with the Senate yet to act. Rural counties with lower-wage service and retail bases would feel a binding minimum wage increase more acutely than high-cost metro counties, making this a live fiscal and labor-cost variable for commerce leaders to track regardless of outcome.
Early indicator
Labor force dropouts statewide rose from roughly 8,000 in early 2025 to over 15,000 by Q3 2025. If that pattern extends into nonmetro counties, a declining labor force participation rate — not rising unemployment — may be the clearer early signal of economic softening in rural labor markets.
Sources & Methodology
Pay and hiring data provided by WageScape. See every source cited in this report, with links →
Advertised pay reflects the pay ranges employers publish in active job postings in this metro, not survey or payroll data. Pay trends compare the current period with the prior period for the same metro and role. Sector figures group postings by the employer's industry classification; sectors with limited classified postings are marked as such rather than estimated. This briefing is independent of, and complements, official statistics from the BLS and state labor market information offices.
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