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Labor Market Pulse
SC NONMETROPOLITAN AREA Edition
Focus: FINANCE
SC nonmetro finance pay climbs even as headcount growth cools.
1.8%
SC nonmetro FY26 job growth forecast
Below long-term trend; FY27 forecast at 1.7%
$104,601
Controller advertised pay
Up significantly locally vs $112,500 national median
$1,130
SC average weekly wage
Down 0.1% YoY, Aug 2026 vs Aug 2025
4.1%
SC unemployment rate
Down 0.5 pts over 12 months; tied 1st in US job growth
This Month's Takeaways
Controller pay is rising sharply while overall wages stall.
Advertised Controller pay in this market is up significantly to $104,601, even as statewide average weekly wages slipped 0.1 percent year-over-year. Budget models built on flat statewide wage assumptions will understate the true cost of backfilling or retaining senior finance leadership.
FP&A Manager pay is the one role moving against the grain.
Advertised FP&A Manager pay fell moderately to $124,493 locally, bucking the upward trend seen across nearly every other finance role tracked this month. This may reflect a temporary softening in demand for forecasting talent locally rather than a durable shift — worth revisiting before resetting FP&A comp bands downward.
Tax Specialist and Credit Analyst pay signal a tightening niche.
Both roles show significant advertised pay increases locally, outpacing national Credit Analyst movement and matching national Tax Specialist gains. Nonmetro employers appear to be competing directly with metro and national markets for these specialized finance functions, a shift that changes how these roles should be benchmarked.
Skills gap in technical roles is a budgeting risk, not just a hiring one.
State labor market intelligence flags engineering, advanced manufacturing, and cybersecurity as acute skills-gap areas, and finance functions supporting these industries — cost accounting, FP&A — face spillover pressure. Headcount cost plans built on historical fill rates may need wider contingency bands for finance roles embedded in technically constrained business units.
Local Labor Conditions
South Carolina's rural and nonmetro counties are riding the state's broader momentum — 38,600 jobs added statewide over the past year and unemployment down to 4.1 percent — but forecasted employment growth is projected to slow to 1.8 percent in FY26, below long-term trend, signaling a cooling expansion rate even as talent scarcity persists. Finance and insurance added 2,076 jobs statewide over the year, a modest but visible signal that nonmetro employers are still competing for accounting and finance talent against a shrinking rural labor force participation rate of 58.8 percent.
Leadership & Talent Implications
Slowing statewide job growth combined with continued advertised pay increases for Controller, Financial Analyst, and Tax Specialist roles in this market suggests wage pressure is decoupling from headcount expansion — employers are paying more for the same or fewer positions, tightening cost-per-hire even as budgeted headcount growth softens. This dynamic complicates FY27 headcount cost planning, since compensation inflation in finance-critical roles is outpacing broader wage trends (statewide average weekly wages actually fell 0.1 percent year-over-year) even as hiring volume cools. Consider reviewing budgeted comp escalators for finance and accounting roles separately from general merit pool assumptions, since these roles appear to be moving on a distinct trajectory from the broader nonmetro wage environment.
