Last Updated : - July 3, 2019

West Virginia Employment Statistics

  • 51,112 employers
  • 693,374 employees
  • $887 average weekly wage
  • The average weekly wage is 19.4% below the national average
  • The cost of living is 5.3% below the national average

For complete coverage and the latest employment statistics as compiled by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, see: West Virginia Employment Statistics

State Business & Employment Since 2009

  • 2,752 more businesses
  • 1,376 more employees
  • 0.2% increase in total wages
  • $9,223 increase in annual wages per employee
  • 25.0% increase in wages per employee

For our analysis of key data changes for business and employment data since the end of the recession in 2009, see: West Virginia Employment Growth Since the Recession


Business & Employment by County

County with the Most Businesses: Kanawha County West Virginia, 5,383
County with the Most Employees: Kanawha County West Virginia, 78,288
County with Highest Average Hourly Wage: Marshall County West Virginia, $1,202
County with Highest Unemployment Rate: Calhoun County West Virginia, 19.1%

For a breakout of business and employment data by county for the state of West Virginia, see: West Virginia Employment Statistics by County

Occupations

For a breakout of occupations across the state of West Virginia see: West Virginia Occupational Statistics

Monthly Employment and Unemployment Data

  • 68,347 employed workers
  • 703,401 unemployed workers
  • 8.9% unemployment rate

Monthly employment, unemployment and wage data for the state of West Virginia, see: West Virginia Monthly Employment Data

Quarterly Employment and Unemployment Data

  • 51,183 employers, down 0.3% from 51,332
  • 693,028 employees, down 2.1% from 677,982
  • The average weekly wage is 23.7% below the national average
  • The cost of living is 8.9% below the national average

Quarterly employment statistics for West Virginia, see: West Virginia Quarterly Employment Data



Data Sources



About the Writer

This page was created and is maintained by Kurt Tietjen, Founder of Stavera, High Peak Media & HomeGearWorks.com. Kurt is an executive, data scientist and software engineer who holds an MBA in Management Information Systems. In 2010, he partnered with scientists at Northwestern University to launch The Street Wire. This was one of the first mainstream uses of what would become “Narrative Science”, an artificial intelligence platform specializing in natural language generation. You can contact Kurt on LinkedIn here.