Carpentry Pay and Job Outlook

Carpenters held 959,000 jobs in the United States in 2024, and BLS projects about 74,100 openings a year over the 2024 to 2034 decade. Employment is projected to grow 4 percent across that decade, about as fast as the average for all occupations. The median annual wage was $59,310 in May 2024.

Why it matters on the job

Those four numbers appear in every article written about this trade, and three of the four are routinely misread. The openings figure is not job growth. The median is not a starting wage. And a national figure describes no local market, including yours.

Worked example: where 74,100 openings come from

Start with growth. 4 percent of 959,000 is 959,000 × 0.04 = 38,360 additional jobs across the whole decade, which is 38,360 / 10 = 3,836 a year.

Now take that out of the openings figure. 74,100 - 3,836 = 70,264 openings a year that come from something other than expansion. That is 70,264 / 74,100 = roughly 95 percent of all projected openings.

Almost all of the annual openings are replacement, and replacement does not need a construction boom

Replacement means carpenters retiring, moving into other occupations, or leaving the workforce. That is the honest reading of demand in this trade: the industry needs a steady stream of new carpenters to stand in for the ones walking out, and that stream keeps running whether or not housing starts are up.

Reading the median

$59,310 a year is a median, so half of all carpenters earned less than that and half earned more. Converted at 2,080 hours (40 hours a week for 52 weeks), that is 59,310 / 2,080 = $28.51 an hour.

Two things the median does not tell you. It does not tell you what a first-period apprentice earns, because apprentice wages start well below journey rate and step up on a schedule. And it does not tell you what a carpenter earns where you live, because carpentry pay tracks local construction activity, union density and cost of living far more closely than any national average can carry.

Do not cross the wage tables

Carpenters are SOC 47-2031. Cabinetmakers and bench carpenters are SOC 51-7011, a manufacturing occupation with entirely separate wage and employment data. Woodworkers are different again. When you compare a figure you found online against the ones above, check the occupation code first, because the same everyday word covers three different data sets.

Where it bites

• Openings are not growth. 74,100 a year is mostly people leaving, and it is still a real hiring number. That is what makes it the useful figure rather than the growth rate.
• Median is not entry. Ask the sponsor what a first-period apprentice earns in the program you are applying to, and what journey rate is when you top out. Those two numbers decide your next five years; the national median does not.
• These figures move on an annual cycle. The Occupational Outlook Handbook updates every year. Carry the year stamp with the number, and re-check before you make a decision on the strength of it.
• National is not local. Two hours in the truck can change a carpenter’s rate more than a decade of national projections will.