Library Guides: Prices and Wages by Decade: 1940-1949

Wages in the United States, 1940-1949

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WAGES -- GENERAL SOURCES (all occupations and worker types)

Federal Minimum Wage chart, 1938-2009
Chart from the U.S. Dept of Labor shows the first federal minimum wage law enacted in 1938 (25 cents), and all subsequent increases through 2009. By contrast, certain states enacted minimum wage laws as far back as the 1910s. See also this history of state minimum wage laws from 1912-1958.
State minimum wage laws, 1940
Some states had minimum wage laws only for certain occupations and industries. This source lists each state that had any minimum wage as of 1940 and listed out the rates in detail. Tables begin on page 6.
State minimum wage laws, 1949-1950
The states of CA, CT, MA, NH, ND, RI, WA, WI and Puerto Rico had minimum wage laws in 1949 that covered specified types of workers in particular occupations. The chart in this source tells minimum wages for each.
Median wage and salary income by occupation for MALES - 1949
Source: 1950 Census. Shows data for male workers with and without occupational breakouts in Table 22, pages 231-238. Find the median at the far right-hand side of the table. Immediately following the data for males is a table for females. If citing this report, use info from the title page.
Negroes and whites - Wage and salary income, 1939-1960
The source Economic Situation of Negroes in the United States compares median wages and salary income for white race and non-white races, with breakouts by sex. Provides data for the years 1939, 1947, 1957, 1958, 1959, 1960. The preface states that "Negroes constitute more than 95% of the non-white residents of the U.S." See also a chart showing median family income by race [from all sources, not just job earnings] from 1945-1950 in Employment and Income of Negro Workers, 1940-1952 in the June 1953 issue of Monthly Labor Review.
Hundreds of occupations - Typical expected earnings, 1940s
The U. S. Dept of Labor's Occupational Outlook Handbook (a favorite source in libraries) shows hundreds of occupations each discussed in short chapters, along with earnings data. They attempted to find the most recent data when the volume went to press in the late 1940s, so expect earnings data to range from 1941 up to early 1948. Occupations are grouped by category: professional, administrative, clerical, sales, service, industrial, trades, and agricultural occupations, some with geographic breakdown. Find the page number for an occupation in the table of contents, then enter it in the "Jump to..." box. Earnings are listed near the end of each short chapter.
Hours and Earnings in the United States, 1932-40: With Supplement for 1941
Movements of hours and wages, 1932-40, hours and earnings, farm wage rates.
War and Postwar Wages, Prices, and Hours, 1914-23 and 1939-44
Compares wage rates and hours of work for the WWI and WWII eras, focusing specifically on the manufacturing, mining, railroad, printing and maritime industries, as well as farm labor wages. Discussion puts wage data in context with price levels which were definitely affected by the wars.
Government (municipal) Salaries and earnings,1944
Average hourly earnings, hours or work, estimated annual salaries for 15 U.S. cities.
Congressional salaries, 1789-present
Historical chart shows salaries of members of the U.S. Congress, along with dates of enactment and statutory authority for each pay increase.
Average earnings by industry (SIC) code - 1940-1990
This source provides wage/earnings data for industries, but each industry has a different start date. Some date back to around 1940, such as for workers in the railroad industries. The wholesale and retail trade industry data only goes back to 1947.

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Source: Employment, Hours, and Earnings, United States, 1909-90 : Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 2370 : Volume II
Occupational Wage Surveys
Lists wages by region and by occupation. Some tables are broken down by gender. View full text documents from 1949 to about 1973. More in Hathi Trust.
Wage Chronologies
Lists of monitored changes in wage rates for selected large U.S. companies including General Motors, Chrysler Corp., Lockheed Aircraft Corporation, Berkshire Hathaway, Swift, Armour, United States Steel Corporation, Carolina Coach Co., Western Greyhound Bus Lines, International Harvester Company, International Shoe Co., Bethlehem Atlantic shipyards, Sinclair Oil Companies, Pacific Coast Shipbuilding, Massachusetts Shoe Manufacturing, Ford Motor Company, International Paper Co., Aluminum Company of America, Rockwell International, Boeing, and more. Covers the late 1930s through the 1970s.
Hourly Earnings in ... Industries : Selected Wage Areas, 1947-1950
Honolulu HI -Wartime Earnings and Spending, 1943
Family income and outlay by category.
Economy of Hawaii in 1947 : with Special Reference to Wages, Working Conditions and Industrial Relations
Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 926

WOMEN'S WAGES

Median wage and salary income by occupation for FEMALES - 1949
Data for women workers, with and without occupational breakouts is reported in Table 22 (pp. 239-246. Find the median at the far right-hand side of the table. If citing this report, use info from the title page.
Womens' median wage/salary income, 1939-1951
Compares men's and women's median wages or salaries. See also a narrative explanation in the chapter on Income, starting on page 82.
Women's Reserve, U.S. Marine Corps - Pay, 1944
Marine Corps brochure shows monthly base pay for colonels, lieutenant colonels, majors, captains, 1st and 2nd lieutenants, sergeants, corporals and privates. Also shows base pay for cooks, drum majors and musicians.
Dietitians and nutritionists' income in 1949 (females only)
Table shows income ranges by state and region.

Wages by Occupation / Industry - 1940s

Agriculture - Wartime Wages, Income, and Wage Regulation
Farm wages and labor cost, wage rates by regions, wage rates of piece workers, income of hired workers and family workers.
Agriculture - Farm laborer wages, 1818-1948
Lists average monthly earnings with board, by geographic divisions. Data for years: 1818, 1826, 1830, 1850, 1860, 1870, 1880, 1890, 1909, 1919, 1929, 1940, 1948. Read the explanation and historical context for this table.
Agriculture - Farm labor wages, 1940-1949
The monthly USDA periodical Farm Labor shows farm labor wages with and without room and board, and broken out by geography. These issues are available in HathiTrust as well.
Agriculture - Farm labor wages, 1945-1947
Wages of farm laborers working in specific crops in various states and locations. These reports do not yet seem to be available in full text online, but we do have printed copies in our library and will be happy to do a lookup. Contact govdocs@missouri.edu.
Bank Employees - Earnings, Spring and Summer of 1943
Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 774
Bituminous-Coal Mining - Wage Structure, Fall of 1945
Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 867
Book and job printing, earnings and hours - 1942
Hourly earnings, weekly hours and earnings.
Broadcasting industry (radio and TV) weekly wages, 1947
Shows weekly earnings of full time employees at radio and television stations, including announcers, news personnel, writers, musicians, production men, engineers and technicians, commercial supervisors, clerical employees and broadcasting executives. Excellent descriptions of these jobs are provided elsewhere in the book "Employment Outlook in Radio and Television Broadcasting Occupations."
Building trades, union wages and hours - 1943
Average hourly wage rates, trends, weekly hours, union scales of wages by city and trades.
Building trades - Union wages and hours by city, 1947
Reports both journeymen and apprentice pay for carpenters, bricklayers, plumbers, plasterers and related occupations in the construction industry.
Bus drivers wage rates by city - 1940s
See bus driver wages in the early 1940s, or for the later 1940s, find hourly wages listed in these annual issues: 1946, 1947, 1948, and 1949
Carpenters' union wages - 1940
This is a union publication rather than a government document. The United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America published an annual publication titled The Carpenter. In it, one can find union wages by city and state. Although this source is not available in Hathi Trust past 1922, our library has a set and would look up a wage upon request. The union wages for 1940 begin on page 35 of the October 1940 issue.
Chiropractor income by state, 1949
Source: Health Manpower Source Book
Common Laborers - Starting wages in large cities, 1943
Average hourly entrance rates, variation by industry, rates in individual cities. Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 775
County officers' compensation in Missouri counties, 1945
This report includes tables showing gross commissions and fees as well as estimated net compensation of County Collectors and other county officers in a number of Missouri counties. Source: Committee on Legislative Research Report No. 6
Dentists' income, 1929-1948
Nine-page article includes breakouts by state, by size of community, by source of income, and more.
Dentists' income by state, 1949
Source: Health Manpower Source Book
Department and Clothing Stores, Large Cities - Wages, Spring and Summer 1943
Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 801
Education - Instructional staff salaries by state, 1929-1946
Table 8 shows average salaries of instructional staff (principals, supervisors and teachers) for every state in every year from 1929-1946. Source: U.S. Biennial Survey of Education.
Education - Instructional staff salaries by state and race, 1939-1940
Table 7 shows average salary for instructional staff in elementary and secondary schools by race in the states of AL, AR, DE, DC, FL, GA, KY, LA, MD, MS, MO, NC, OK, SC, TN, YX, VA, WV.
Education - Instructional staff salaries by state, 1947-1948
Shows average salaries for staff in urban and rural schools in 36 states. See note at the top of table 2: "Instructional staff" includes principals, supervisors, teachers, librarians, psychologists, deans, etc.
Electroplating and Polishing Industry - Wage Structure, January 1945
Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 875
Fabricated Structural Steel Industry - Wage Structure, January 1945
Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 866
Government (federal) - Pay scales, 1930-1949
Table shows the basic annual pay rates for federal employees of various services and grades (GS-1 through GS-18, P, SP, CAF and CPC). These are not salary averages.
Government pay by occupation, Missouri - 1949
Shows pay to state government employees such as chemists, financial officers, inspectors, actuaries, judges, janitors, librarians, highway patrolmen, statisticians, telephone operators, carpenters, typists, watchmen and many more. Also shows salaries for the top officials in executive agencies. Recommended: use the search in text feature to find occupations.
Government (municipal) Salaries and earnings,1944
Average hourly earnings, hours or work, estimated annual salaries.
Hospital jobs for women - Early 1940s
Source tells average monthly salaries and cash wages for female hospital orderlies, ward aides and practical nurses.
Hotel Occupations - Employment Outlook: Duties, Qualifications, Outlook, Earnings, Working Conditions
Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 905
Laundry and dry cleaning workers in Rhode Island, 1949
Extensive 168-page Rhode Island state document gives detail on wages, hours and working conditions in laundries and dry cleaners.
Law School faculty and administrator salaries, 1948-1949
Includes salaries of both instructors and deans. Law librarian salaries are also included. This is not a government document.
Lawyers' income, 1929-1948
Shows lawyers' incomes by regions and states, by size of community served, by the age of the lawyer and number of years in practice, by WWII veteran status, and more. Source: "Income of Lawyers, 1929-1948" in the August 1949 issue of Survey of Current Business.
Lawyers' income, 1936-1941
This report provides especially good detail for the year 1941.
Lawyers' income, 1947-1954
With breakouts by state, by size of law firm, size of the community served, age of the lawyer, number of years in practice, type of clientele, and more. Source: "Income of Lawyers in the Postwar Period" published in the December 1956 issue of Survey of Current Business, pp. 26-36.
Lumber industry wages, 1944
Wage levels in union and nonunion operations, occupational average hourly earnings.
Lumber industry wages, 1944
Covers CA, OR, WA, ID, MT only.
Machinery Industries - Wage Structure, January 1945
Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 861
Manufacturing
See box below for manufacturing wages by industry.

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Includes links to general sources and sources specific to the following industries: aircraft, ammunition and explosives, carpet and rugs, clothing, fertilizer, food, grain products, industrial machinery and machine tools, motor-vehicle, rubber, and textiles.
Medical personnel - Income of physicians, dentists and [other health workers], 1939-1976
Median net income of office-based nonsalaried physicians, dentists and male professional workers in health professions. Covers 1939, 1947, 1951, 1955, 1963, 1965, 1967, and 1970-1976.
Mining iron - Wages, 1943
Hourly earnings by occupation, trend of hourly earnings, entrance rates for male common labor.
Motortruck drivers and helpers - Union wages, 1941
Shows trends of wages per hour and hours per week of union motortruck drivers and helpers, divided by city and job classification. The tables compare June 1940 with June 1941.
Motortruck drivers and helpers - union wages -1936-1960
Includes data from cities with 500,000 or more population, with mileage data.
Metals Industry (nonferrous) - Wage Structure, 1941-1942
Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 729
Metalworking Industries wage structure - 1945
Covers 14 metalworking industries. Average hourly rates by occupation, size of establishment, size of community.
Nurse earnings - 1946 and 1949
Shows median monthly earnings of nurses in different fields of practice, for example, working in hospitals, in private duty, for industry, etc. Also shows different pay rates for nurses living in the hospitals and outside of them.
Nurses - Median income by state, 1949
Source: Health Manpower Source Book
Office Workers - Salaries in selected large cities
Covers 23 occupations with industry breakdowns in the cities of Atlanta, Boston, Buffalo, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Milwaukee, New York, San Francisco-Oakland, and Seattle. Most data appears to be from 1947-1948.
Office Workers - Earnings trends
Earnings of white-collar clerical and office workers, professional and semiprofessional workers, government employees.
Office Workers in Metalworking Industries - Wages, January 1945
Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 886
Optometrists - Median income by state, 1949
Source: Health Manpower Source Book
Petroleum Drilling and Production in the OK, TX and Louisiana,, 1944
Average hourly earnings, occupational differences. Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 810
Petroleum industry in OK, TX and Louisiana, 1943
Average hourly earnings, occupational differences, regional differences.
Pharmacists' median income, 1949 (males only)
Source: Health Manpower Source Book
Pharmacists serving in the Navy, 1943
Navy pamphlet shows base pay for pharmacists, pharmacist's mates, and hospital apprentices. A table spanning pages 10-11 gives further breakouts for each, and tells the additional allowance for dependents.
Physicians' income, 1929-1949
Data from the U.S. Dept of Health, Education and Welfare's Health Manpower Sourcebook series:
- Income of non-salaried physicians,1929-1949
- Mean income of physicians by state, 1949
- Median income of physicians and surgeons, 1949 (males only)
- Mean net income by medical specialty, 1949
  This would include obstetricians, ophthalmologists, pediatricians, urologists, psychiatrists, surgeons, and more.
- Osteopaths' income
Printing Trades - Union wages and hours
Printing trades - Union wages, hours, and working conditions, 1941
Years shown span from 1907 to 1941 and show the rates both for the printing trade as a whole as well as for individual trades. Shows distribution of union members in the trades, changes in union rates and hours, and scales by trades and cities for 1940 and 1941.
Prisoner of war wages - World War II
Policies on pay for prisoners of war varied over the time that WWII was being fought, and there were sometimes differences based on the rank of the prisoner and the type of work he would be doing. For quick location of pages discussing labor pay, do a search on the word "cents" and look at pages 75 and up.
Psychologists' income by state, 1949
Source: Health Manpower Source Book
Railroad worker earnings, 1940
Check table of contents for additional data tables on employee earnings. Source: Wages and labor relations in the railroad industry, 1900-1941: an historical survey and summary of results.
Scientists's earnings, 1948-1949
The BLS sent questionnaires to all who were listed in the 1944 edition of American Men of Science. Shows earnings breakouts for chemists, biologists, engineers, physicists and electronic scientists, earth scientists, mathematicians, medical specialists, statisticians and psychologists.
Service occupations - 1949
For service occupations such as nurse, cook, teacher, housekeeper, etc. we recommend the Occupational Outlook Handbook. Hundreds of occupations are each discussed in short chapters, along with earnings data for each. See the page number in the table of contents, then enter it in the "Jump to..." box. Earnings data are listed near the end of each section.
Ship Construction Yards - Earnings, Fall of 1942
Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 752
Ship-Repair Yards (private) - Hourly Earnings, Spring 1943
Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 763
Shipyards (private) - Hourly Earnings, 1942
Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 727
Social worker salaries by city, 1945
Tables 8-9 show median salaries and salary ranges for social workers in Chicago, Los Angeles, Detroit, Philadelphia, Cincinnati and New York City.
Streetcar and Bus Operators - Union Wage Rates, 1942-1945
Street-railway employees - Wages, hours, working conditions in 1941
Goes over each subtopics and how most union agreements handle them. Wage rates are displayed in the tables by city and type of motor vehicle.
Transit (local) - Union wages and hours by city
Shows union wages for bus drivers, trolley employees, cable car "gripmen" and conductors, subway and elevated train operators, platform workers, and other jobs in local transit. See issues for 1946, 1947, 1948, and 1949
Truckdrivers and helpers - Union wages and hours
Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics
Veterinarians' income, 1941
Breaks out veterinarians' income by age of workers, also by the type of job, for example, working in an independent practice, doing research/education, inspection of meat and milk, etc.
Veterinarians' income, 1949
Source: Health Manpower Source Book

WAGES in MANUFACTURING, 1940s -- General sources

See tabs above for specific industries

Manufacturing job hours and earnings, 1919-1960
Very simple table shows average hours and earnings for all production workers in manufacturing for each year from 1919-1960.
Manufacturing industries - Earnings
This publication "Employment, Hours, and Earnings, United States, 1909-90" shows average hourly or weekly wages in both "current" and "constant" (1982) dollars. Data is listed by industry and broken out by sex, but not by occupation. Volume I lists wages for goods-producing industries; Volume II for service industries. Link for Volume II

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Source: Employment, Hours, and Earnings, United States, 1909-90 : Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 2370 : Volume I
Factory workers - Spendable earnings, 1941-43.
Compares factory workers' "take home" pay to the cost of living between the years of 1941-1943.
Also available on FRASER. Source: U.S. BLS Bulletin no. 769 or Serial Set no. 10906.
Manufacturing Industry wages in wartime
Trends in factory wages, average hourly and weekly earnings.

WAGES in AIRCRAFT MANUFACTURING, 1940s