Sources & References
Metro Job Market Pulse · Topeka, 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
Topeka MSA preliminary unemployment rate reached 5.0% in July 2026
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics — BLS Economy at a Glance, Topeka MSA, extracted Sept 2026
Shawnee County had the largest wage increase among large Kansas counties in Q3 2025
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics — BLS County Employment and Wages release
This Month's Takeaways
Zero Kansas WARN notices filed in the 90 days through Sept 25, 2026
Kansas WARN Database — State WARN notice tracking, September 2026
Government employment fell 216,000 nationally over the past year
Bureau of Labor Statistics — National payroll employment data, September 2026
Looking Ahead
Kansas labor force participation rate was 67.4% in April 2026
Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City — Tenth District Beige Book, September 2026
National wage growth slowed to 3.0% annually, lowest since May 2021
Bureau of Labor Statistics — September 2026 jobs report wage data
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