Electrician Salary in Pennsylvania 2026,
$67,600 Median | BLS Data by City

Pennsylvania electricians earn a median $67,600 a year, or $32.50 an hour, per BLS OEWS May 2025, with a band from $45,600 at the 10th percentile to $122,620 at the 90th. That is 7.0% above the national median of $63,190 — one of the few occupations in this unit where Pennsylvania pays above the national figure. The extraordinary width of the band is the real story: the 90th percentile is close to double the median.

Reading, at $75,070, narrowly ahead of Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington $74,590, then Harrisburg-Carlisle $71,820, Scranton–Wilkes-Barre $69,540 and Pittsburgh $69,340. All five exceed the $67,600 state median, which means rural Pennsylvania electrical work sits below all of them. Bear in mind that a metro median averages union and non-union work together and therefore hides the split that actually determines an individual's pay.

Not at state level — Pennsylvania issues no state journeyman or master electrician licence and has no state examining board for the trade. Licensing is municipal: Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and other cities run their own electrical licensing and examinations, with their own requirements, and a licence from one does not carry to another. What is statewide is the Uniform Construction Code, which sets the electrical standard work is inspected against.

Union scale. Pennsylvania has a strong unionised commercial and industrial electrical sector, particularly in the Philadelphia and Pittsburgh markets, and scale rates on large projects sit far above what non-union residential and light commercial work pays. Those two markets are counted on the same OEWS row, which is why a $67,600 median coexists with a $95,500 seventy-fifth percentile and a $122,620 ninetieth. It is a two-tier trade, and which tier an electrician is in matters more than how long they have been in it.

The state takes a flat 3.07% — favourable at the top of this band, where a progressive state would take much more. On top sit a municipal and school district Earned Income Tax, commonly around 1%, and the Philadelphia city wage tax, which applies to income earned in the city by non-residents as well as residents. For a trade that moves between job sites, that last item is worth tracking per project rather than assuming.

It describes a controlled, well-paid trade rather than a scarce one. Pennsylvania employs proportionally fewer electricians than the national average while paying 7.0% above the national median, which is the standard signature of a strongly unionised construction sector: the joint apprenticeship committees control entry, the collective agreements set scale, and the number of positions at that scale reflects contractor demand rather than open competition. For someone entering the trade in Pennsylvania, the practical implication is that getting into the right apprenticeship is worth more than getting into the trade quickly, because the two routes lead to different halves of this wage band.

It is wages only, and the union tier's real compensation is much larger than the wage. Collective agreements in Pennsylvania's electrical trade carry pension and annuity contributions, health and welfare funds and defined benefit structures that OEWS does not capture at all — so the gap between the lower and upper halves of this band is wider in total compensation than the published percentiles show. Against that, construction work is weather- and project-dependent, and the annualisation assumes full-year employment that not every electrician achieves.

Entry route, then classification, then leadership. Entry route is decisive and comes first in a career: an IBEW joint apprenticeship places an electrician on a scale progression toward the $95,500 upper quartile, while a non-union residential route generally does not. Classification follows — industrial, high-voltage and specialised systems work pays above general commercial. Leadership is third: foreman and general foreman roles on large projects carry premiums over scale, and they are the most common route to the $122,620 ninetieth percentile short of running a contracting business.