An article in the Chattanooga Times Free Press discussed how the average wage in the Chattanooga MSA trail that of the United States as a whole:
Data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics shows the average pay in a six-county region around Chattanooga increased about 4% year-over-year in May 2025 to $28.21 per hour, equating to approximately $58,676 per year for someone working 40 hours per week.
Nationally, that number rose nearly 3% to $33.54 in May 2025, or about $69,763 for a full year.
CRER director and chief economist Howard Wall was asked what he thought explained the data:
“Part of it is lower average education,” Howard Wall, the director of the Center for Regional Economic Research, said by phone. “If you take into account lower prices here, it’s a little bit closer. But, it’s still lower wages primarily because of the types of jobs and the human capital and education of the population. So the key to raising it is, as usual, education and growth.”
Wall published a paper in January 2025 that found Chattanooga’s average hourly wage grew from $23.20 in 2001 to $26.19 in 2023. Over the same time span, the rest of the country saw pay rise from $26.16 to $31.48. However, he also noted that wage inequality in Chattanooga has been significantly lower than the United States as a whole.
“Compared to a lot of other towns, Chattanooga doesn’t have huge amounts of really, really, really rich people who own the major Fortune 500 companies,” Wall said in an interview last year. “Other cities have that.”