Sources & References
Metro Job Market Pulse · Winchester, VA-WV 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
National labor force participation rate at 61.8%, little changed since January
Bureau of Labor Statistics — September 2026 labor force participation data
This Month's Takeaways
2026 average monthly job gains of 50 vs 17 in 2025 for Winchester metro
Bureau of Labor Statistics — Winchester MSA nonfarm payroll monthly change data
Local Economic Conditions
Winchester MSA unemployment rate at 3.70% in June 2026, up from 3.20% a year earlier
Bureau of Labor Statistics (via FRED metro data) — Winchester VA-WV MSA unemployment rate series
Frederick County manufacturing and transportation/warehousing employment growth figures
Bureau of Labor Statistics / local economic data aggregator — County-level industry employment change figures
Looking Ahead
National wage growth at 3.0% annual vs 3.4% inflation, lowest since May 2021
Bureau of Labor Statistics — September 2026 average hourly earnings and CPI data
National WARN filings naming Amazon, Meta, Verizon, Oracle among major 2026 filers
Newsweek / LayoffAlert.org — 2026 WARN Act notice tracking by employer
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