Top Metro Areas for Postmasters: New York Leads, Los Angeles Pays Most

Across the top 10 metro areas in this ranking, pay for postmasters and mail superintendents is consistently above the national median, but the metros separate from one another on a mix of salary levels, employment counts, and LaborCove Geography Scores. Nationally, the occupation has a median annual salary of $96,660 and an employment count of 13,810 positions. It also carries a national projected employment growth rate of -3.5%, which is a U.S.-wide occupational projection rather than a forecast for any specific metro. Within that national context, each of the top 10 metros in this ranking has a median salary above the national median. The LaborCove Geography Score offers another way to distinguish metros that might otherwise look similar on headline pay alone. For example, the New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ metro has the highest LaborCove Geography Score in the ranking, while Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA has the highest median salary among the listed metros. That separation between score and pay illustrates why LaborCove ranks locations using multiple metrics rather than salary alone. Employment counts also vary across the top 10 metros. New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ has an employment count of 550, which is the largest metro employment figure supplied in this dataset. Several other metros in the top 10 have employment counts at or below 120. These differences indicate that LaborCove’s rankings reflect more than scale alone, because metros with smaller supplied employment counts still appear prominently in the top 10. Taken together, the data show that top-ranked metros for postmasters and mail superintendents can stand out for different reasons: some combine relatively high employment and solid pay, others emphasize higher pay with more modest employment counts, and their Geography Scores capture how those elements fit into LaborCove’s overall assessment.

Nationally, postmasters and mail superintendents have a median annual salary of $96,660 and an employment count of 13,810. In the top 10 metros listed here, every median salary exceeds the national median. For example, New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ has a median salary of $101,150, and Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA has a median salary of $113,430. Employment counts at the metro level are necessarily smaller than the national total. New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ has an employment count of 550, while Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN has an employment count of 200 and Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH has 180. These figures sit within the broader national employment total of 13,810, showing how metro-level counts represent local slices of the national occupation.

New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ ranks #1 among metros in this LaborCove list, with a Geography Score of 68.06. It combines that top score with a median salary of $101,150 and an employment count of 550, the largest metro employment figure supplied in this dataset. Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, PA-NJ-DE-MD, at rank #5, has an employment count of 240 and a median salary of $99,840, while Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN, at rank #8, has an employment count of 200 and a median salary of $101,130. Both metros have smaller employment counts than New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ and lower Geography Scores, which aligns with their lower rankings in this particular LaborCove list. Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH sits at rank #6 with a Geography Score of 43.21, a median salary of $101,150, and an employment count of 180. Compared with New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ, Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH has the same reported median salary, a smaller employment count, and a lower Geography Score, reinforcing New York’s position at the top of this ranking.

Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA ranks #2 with a Geography Score of 60.14 and a median salary of $113,430. That median salary is higher than the median salaries for New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ at $101,150 and Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH at $101,150. Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL, at rank #3, has a median salary of $111,170, which is higher than the median salaries in Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, PA-NJ-DE-MD at $99,840 and Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN at $101,130. Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler, AZ, ranked #4, has a median salary of $110,310, which is also higher than the median salary in Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, PA-NJ-DE-MD. San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad, CA, at rank #7, has a median salary of $106,320, which is higher than the median salaries in Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, PA-NJ-DE-MD, Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH, and Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN. These comparisons illustrate that a higher salary does not automatically correspond to a higher LaborCove Geography Score or a higher overall rank.

Several metros in the top 10 have relatively modest employment counts compared with New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ. Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA has an employment count of 120, which is lower than the New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ employment count of 550, yet it ranks #2 overall. Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL and Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler, AZ each have employment counts of 40, which are also lower than the New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ figure, yet they rank #3 and #4, respectively. San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad, CA and San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA each have employment counts of 40 and 80, respectively. Both have smaller employment counts than New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ and still appear in the top 10, with San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad, CA ranked #7 and San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA ranked #9. Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX, with an employment count of 110, also has a lower employment count than New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ and ranks #10. These comparisons show that metros with smaller reported employment counts can still achieve relatively high rankings in LaborCove’s framework when other factors captured in the Geography Score are considered alongside employment.

Among the top 10 metros, salary and Geography Score combinations vary. New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ has a Geography Score of 68.06 and a median salary of $101,150, while Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA has a Geography Score of 60.14 and a higher median salary of $113,430. Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL has a Geography Score of 47.52 and a median salary of $111,170. Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler, AZ and Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL have similar employment counts of 40 but different salaries and Geography Scores: Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler, AZ has a median salary of $110,310 and a Geography Score of 47.42, while Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL has a median salary of $111,170 and a Geography Score of 47.52. Looking at the lower half of the top 10, Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX ranks #10 with a Geography Score of 40.12, a median salary of $102,610, and an employment count of 110. San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA, at rank #9, has a Geography Score of 42.28, a median salary of $102,920, and an employment count of 80. These differences highlight that metros adjacent in the ranking can still be numerically distinct across all three metrics.

LaborCove builds these metro rankings for postmasters and mail superintendents (occupation code 11-9131) from structured labor‑market data and its proprietary LaborCove Geography Score. For this article, national median salary, national employment, and national projected growth refer to the occupation as a whole across the United States. The underlying employment and wage observations for metros and the nation use Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) data with a reference period of May 2025. The ReportYear 2026 is the product year for this LaborCove Insight and does not change the underlying OEWS observation period. The national projected employment growth rate of -3.5% is a separate U.S.-level occupational projection and is not a forecast for any individual metro. Each metro’s ranking, median annual salary, employment count, and LaborCove Geography Score come directly from LaborCove’s database. The Geography Score reflects LaborCove’s scoring methodology applied to the available metrics; the specific internal weighting of those metrics is not detailed here. Readers should treat these rankings as one input to decision‑making and consider personal factors and preferences alongside the data.