Best Metros for Postsecondary Education Teachers in 2026: New York Tops Rankings as California Leads on Pay

Across the top 10 metros for postsecondary education teachers, LaborCove’s data shows clear differences in how markets combine salary levels, employment counts, and Geography Scores. New York-Newark-Jersey City leads the rankings with the highest LaborCove Geography Score and the largest reported local employment count, while several California metros post substantially higher median salaries than the national median. Some metros, such as Eugene-Springfield and Mankato, appear in the top 10 despite missing employment data, underscoring that LaborCove’s ranking is not based solely on job counts. For educators weighing relocation or program-building decisions, the contrast between high-salary but smaller-employment metros and large labor markets with more moderate pay is a central theme in this data. The national growth rate provides broader context for the occupation, but the metro comparisons here are based strictly on the supplied salary, employment, and Geography Score evidence.

Nationally, education teachers, postsecondary have a reported median annual salary of $75,350 in 2026 and employment of 60,830. The occupation also carries a projected national employment growth rate of 2.1%. Against that backdrop, each of the top 10 metros has a reported median salary, and several exceed the national figure by wide margins. Employment counts in the metro data are much smaller than the national total, as expected, with New York-Newark-Jersey City reporting 5,120 employed education teachers, postsecondary — the largest local figure in the supplied evidence and the same as the stated overall largest employment market. Because no metro-level growth rates are supplied, the 2.1% figure should be interpreted strictly as a national projection, not as a signal about future trends in any specific metro area listed here.

New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ holds the #1 LaborCove ranking with a Geography Score of 69.76. Its median salary for education teachers, postsecondary is $80,640, and reported employment is 5,120. New York’s median salary is higher than the 2026 national median of $75,350, but several other metros in the top 10 report higher median salaries. For example, San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara has a median salary of $121,520, and San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad reports $129,100. What clearly distinguishes New York in the supplied data is scale: its employment count of 5,120 is larger than the reported counts for San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara (430), San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad (160), Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim (1,330), Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario (240), Boston-Cambridge-Newton (1,680), and Ann Arbor (180). Despite these other metros sometimes offering higher salaries, New York still earns the highest LaborCove Geography Score among the listed areas.

California features prominently in the top 10, with San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara (#2), San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad (#3), Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim (#5), and Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario (#6) all appearing in the rankings. Each of these California metros reports a median salary above both the national median of $75,350 and New York’s $80,640. San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara shows a median salary of $121,520, San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad reports $129,100, Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim reports $105,730, and Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario reports $123,910. Despite these higher salaries, all four California metros have lower LaborCove Geography Scores than New York-Newark-Jersey City. San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara has a Geography Score of 58.22, San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad is at 54.69, Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim is at 53.73, and Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario stands at 51.09, compared with New York’s 69.76. This demonstrates that the highest salaries do not automatically correspond to the top overall Geography Score in LaborCove’s methodology.

In addition to their higher salaries, the California metros in the top 10 generally show smaller reported employment counts than New York-Newark-Jersey City. San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara has an employment count of 430, and San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad reports 160. Both are smaller than New York’s 5,120. Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, at 1,330, and Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, at 240, also have smaller reported employment counts than New York. Boston-Cambridge-Newton similarly combines a higher median salary than the national level with a smaller reported employment count than New York. Boston’s median salary is $79,980 with 1,680 employed education teachers, postsecondary, both below New York’s employment count but with a median salary above the national median of $75,350.

Three metros in the top 10 — Eugene-Springfield, Mankato, and Kenosha — have missing employment data in the supplied evidence but still achieve relatively strong LaborCove Geography Scores. Eugene-Springfield, OR ranks #4 with a Geography Score of 54.59 and a median salary of $103,930. Mankato, MN ranks #7 with a Geography Score of 46.64 and a median salary of $78,500. Kenosha, WI appears at #10 with a Geography Score of 44.66 and a median salary of $74,090. Among these three, Eugene-Springfield reports the highest median salary, and its Geography Score of 54.59 is also higher than the scores for Mankato and Kenosha. Mankato’s median salary of $78,500 is above the national median of $75,350, while Kenosha’s $74,090 is slightly below the national figure, yet both are still included among the top 10 metros by Geography Score.

LaborCove uses authoritative labor-market sources and its proprietary Geography Score to compare metro areas for each occupation. For education teachers, postsecondary (SOC 25-1081), this Insight uses the supplied 2026 national median salary, national employment, and national projected employment growth as context. Metro-level analysis is based only on the provided LaborCove Geography Score, median annual salary, and employment counts. LaborCove’s Geography Score summarizes multiple factors into a single ranking metric, but the internal weighting of those factors is not disclosed here. Because of that, this article does not claim that any one metric — salary, employment, or otherwise — caused a particular ranking outcome. Instead, it focuses on transparent, numeric comparisons that readers can align with their own priorities. Rankings should be considered alongside personal circumstances, institutional fit, and other non-quantified factors that fall outside the scope of this data.