Tool and Die Makers Salary and Pay

The national wage ladder (BLS OEWS, May 2024)

A percentile marks a point in this occupation's pay distribution: the worker one quarter of the way up the Tool and Die Makers ladder earns the 25th percentile wage, $51,200. BLS top-codes very high wages ($239,200+ a year, $115.00+ an hour) and marks estimates it cannot publish as n/p.

Employment and concentration

With 55,130 jobs nationally, Tool and Die Makers make up 0.04% of U.S. employment as BLS measured it in May 2024. The map is uneven: Michigan alone holds 9,190 of those jobs, the top three states hold 34.9%, and the deepest concentration sits in Michigan (location quotient 5.86, where 1.00 is the national average). A quotient above 2 usually signals a local industry cluster rather than evenly spread demand.

Pay inside the occupation is wide: $43,460 separates the ends of its ladder. The 90th percentile ($87,660) is 2.0 times the 10th percentile ($44,200), a gap of $43,460 a year. The mean of $65,100 sitting above the median of $63,180 tells you the top end pulls the average up: most workers cluster below the mean, and the high tail is thin.

Pay by state

Sorted by employment, the table below puts Michigan first at 9,190 jobs; sorted by median pay instead, Kansas would lead at $81,230. Both orderings are printed in one table:

The occupation in context

Ranked against all 826 published occupations, Tool and Die Makers stands number 373 by employment and number 356 by median pay. Inside its own major group, Production Occupations, the group median wage is $46,020 across 105 detailed occupations, so this occupation pays 37% more than its group median, and it supplies 0.6% of the group's 8,743,430 jobs. In 22 of the 44 states with a published median, the state median beats the national median of $63,180, 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

Detroit-Warren-Dearborn, MI is the largest metro employer with 4,540 jobs, 8.2% of the national total. Two rankings follow across the 175 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

Highest-paying metros (500+ jobs)

At the other end, Pittsburgh, PA posts the lowest mean pay among metros with at least 500 jobs, $57,400 a year, against $87,810 in Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA. The lowest-paying large metro and the highest are both real markets for this occupation; the difference between them is the geography premium, or penalty, in cash terms.

What the median pay looks like as a budget

Budget arithmetic on the median: $5,265 a month before tax, $2,430 biweekly, $1,215 weekly. Moving from the 25th percentile ($51,200) to the 75th ($77,430) is worth $26,230 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 $69,498 would sit between the median ($63,180) and the 75th percentile ($77,430), inside the top half but outside the top quarter of this occupation's ladder. An offer at the 25th percentile, $51,200, is $11,980 under the median, the typical size of the discount attached to entry-level or low-cost-market postings in this field.

Related occupations in Production Occupations

The occupations BLS groups with this one, by size: Ophthalmic Laboratory Technicians, Fiberglass Laminators and Fabricators, Chemical Plant and System Operators, Tailors, Dressmakers, and Custom Sewers, Furnace, Kiln, Oven, Drier, and Kettle Operators and Tenders, Plant and System Operators, All Other. Every one of the 826 published occupations is indexed on the Careers hub.