Hoist and Winch Operators Salary and Pay
How much do Hoist and Winch Operators make?
Hoist and Winch Operators pay a median of $52,310 a year in the BLS May 2024 survey, with a mean of $64,070 across 2,480 counted jobs. Half of all workers in the occupation earn between $39,220 and $90,200.
Hoist and Winch Operators salary data without the self-reported noise: BLS surveyed the employers, and this page prints the ladder, the states, and the metros exactly as the survey published them.
Updated November 5, 2026
Salary converter for this occupation
Gross pay only, before taxes and benefits. The picker starts at this occupation's median ($52,310); the custom box accepts any annual figure, which is how you price an offer letter against the ladder below.
The national wage ladder (BLS OEWS, May 2024)
| Pay level | Annual wage | Hourly wage |
|---|---|---|
| 10th percentile | $33,910 | $16.30 |
| 25th percentile | $39,220 | $18.86 |
| Median (50th) | $52,310 | $25.15 |
| 75th percentile | $90,200 | $43.37 |
| 90th percentile | $116,120 | $55.83 |
Percentiles answer the question a single average cannot: where would a given Hoist and Winch Operators offer sit among all 2,480 workers doing this job? The survey top-codes at $239,200+ and withholds unreliable cells, shown as n/p in the table.
Employment and concentration
BLS counted 2,480 Hoist and Winch Operators jobs in May 2024, which is 0.00% of all U.S. employment in the survey. Work is most concentrated in Hawaii, where the location quotient is 10.62, meaning the occupation holds 10.62 times its national share of local jobs. Illinois employs the most people outright, 310 of them, and the three largest state employers together account for 26.6% of the national total.
The spread matters as much as the center. Earners at the 90th percentile make $116,120, which is 3.4 times the $33,910 at the 10th, a difference of $82,210 annually. Because the mean wage ($64,070) sits above the median ($52,310), a typical offer should be judged against the median and the 25th to 75th percentile band, not the mean.
Pay by state
Every state with a publishable estimate is in this table, 27 of them, sorted by jobs. The pay leader by median is Illinois at $116,120; the jobs leader is Illinois:
| State | Employment | Jobs per 1,000 | Location quotient | Mean annual | Median annual |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Illinois | 310 | 0.1 | 3.13 | $113,000 | $116,120 |
| Washington | 190 | 0.1 | 3.33 | $55,960 | $47,680 |
| Indiana | 160 | 0.1 | 3.10 | $39,440 | $38,370 |
| Maryland | 160 | 0.1 | 3.67 | $87,070 | $87,760 |
| Georgia | 150 | 0.0 | 1.91 | $39,790 | $37,590 |
| Hawaii | 110 | 0.2 | 10.62 | $97,500 | $100,940 |
| Florida | 90 | 0.0 | 0.56 | $46,430 | $38,910 |
| Oregon | 80 | 0.0 | 2.51 | $57,970 | $55,710 |
| Texas | 80 | 0.0 | 0.37 | $37,800 | $36,420 |
| Michigan | 70 | 0.0 | 0.94 | $37,090 | $34,460 |
| Minnesota | 70 | 0.0 | 1.55 | $67,380 | $65,680 |
| West Virginia | 60 | 0.1 | 5.02 | $60,420 | $65,930 |
| Alabama | 50 | 0.0 | 1.53 | $58,930 | $59,220 |
| Idaho | 50 | 0.1 | 3.54 | $51,830 | $50,530 |
| Ohio | 50 | 0.0 | 0.55 | $35,610 | $37,300 |
| Tennessee | 50 | 0.0 | 0.90 | $42,810 | $42,000 |
| Virginia | 50 | 0.0 | 0.74 | $43,930 | $44,310 |
| Kentucky | 40 | 0.0 | 1.26 | $25,160 | $17,330 |
| South Carolina | 40 | 0.0 | 1.01 | $37,720 | $35,970 |
| Wyoming | 40 | 0.1 | 7.89 | $84,970 | $73,840 |
| Alaska | 30 | 0.1 | 5.88 | $49,580 | $48,930 |
| Mississippi | 30 | 0.0 | 1.79 | $27,240 | $22,150 |
| Nevada | 30 | 0.0 | 1.38 | $84,570 | $90,120 |
| Massachusetts | n/p | n/p | n/p | $78,150 | $61,720 |
| Missouri | n/p | n/p | n/p | $45,860 | $46,680 |
| New York | n/p | n/p | n/p | $81,250 | $58,980 |
| Wisconsin | n/p | n/p | n/p | $37,050 | $37,610 |
The occupation in context
Ranked against all 826 published occupations, Hoist and Winch Operators stands number 797 by employment and number 487 by median pay. Inside its own major group, Transportation and Material Moving Occupations, the group median wage is $52,310 across 50 detailed occupations, so this occupation pays 0% more than its group median, and it supplies 0.0% of the group's 13,645,590 jobs. In 11 of the 27 states with a published median, the state median beats the national median of $52,310, which is the single best quick test of whether this occupation's pay is set nationally or locally: a high count means local markets regularly outbid the national figure.
Metropolitan areas: where the jobs and the pay sit
Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN is the largest metro employer with 290 jobs, 11.7% of the national total. Two rankings follow across the 9 metros BLS publishes for this occupation: where the jobs are, then where the money is, with the pay ranking restricted to metros employing at least 500 people in this occupation to keep small samples out of the lead.
Largest metro employers
| Metropolitan area | Employment | Mean annual | Median annual |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN | 290 | $115,410 | $116,120 |
| Baltimore-Columbia-Towson, MD | 150 | $88,100 | $90,200 |
| Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA | 140 | $57,440 | $47,680 |
| Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Roswell, GA | 80 | $45,400 | $45,480 |
| Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington, MN-WI | 70 | $67,710 | $65,680 |
| Detroit-Warren-Dearborn, MI | 40 | $34,760 | $34,460 |
| Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX | 30 | $39,600 | $37,180 |
| Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH | n/p | $83,910 | $96,030 |
| New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ | n/p | $102,960 | $141,930 |
What the median pay looks like as a budget
Budget arithmetic on the median: $4,359 a month before tax, $2,012 biweekly, $1,006 weekly. Moving from the 25th percentile ($39,220) to the 75th ($90,200) is worth $50,980 a year, which is the realistic size of the experience and specialization premium inside this occupation. To turn any of these gross figures into spendable money, run them through the paycheck calculator; to weigh an offer against your current role, use the salary calculator; to test a raise against prices, the raise vs inflation calculator.
To place a real offer: a salary of $57,541 would sit between the median ($52,310) and the 75th percentile ($90,200), inside the top half but outside the top quarter of this occupation's ladder. An offer at the 25th percentile, $39,220, is $13,090 under the median, the typical size of the discount attached to entry-level or low-cost-market postings in this field.
Related occupations in Transportation and Material Moving Occupations
Sibling occupations in Transportation and Material Moving Occupations: Refuse and Recyclable Material Collectors, Parking Attendants, Flight Attendants, Airline Pilots, Copilots, and Flight Engineers, Automotive and Watercraft Service Attendants, Commercial Pilots. Medians there are computed identically, so the comparison is apples to apples; the full set lives on the Careers hub.
Frequently asked questions
How much do Hoist and Winch Operators make an hour?
The median hourly wage is $25.15, and the mean hourly wage is $30.81, from the May 2024 OEWS estimates. Annual figures for Hoist and Winch Operators use the survey's 2,080-hour year where a conversion is needed, which is how the $52,310 annual median and the hourly figures reconcile.
Which state pays Hoist and Winch Operators the most?
Illinois, with a median annual wage of $116,120 across 310 jobs. The full state table on this page ranks every publishing state by employment and shows median and mean side by side.
How big is the Hoist and Winch Operators workforce?
2,480 wage and salary workers in May 2024, 0.00% of U.S. employment in the survey. Employment concentrates most in Hawaii by location quotient (10.62).
How current is this Hoist and Winch Operators salary data?
These are the May 2024 OEWS estimates behind the $52,310 median and the 2,480 job count on this page, released by BLS on April 2, 2025 and downloaded on November 5, 2026. OEWS is an employer survey, so those figures describe wages actually paid in this occupation, not advertised ranges.