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Yearly Federal Data States Cumberland County Saw Wage Increases, But Is Behind National Average

The federal government Wednesday released employment and wage data for the country's largest counties. Cumberland is the only Maine county on that list.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics says the county had about 14,000 businesses employing nearly 186,000 workers in December of last year. It says those workers earned, on average, about $52,350 per year. That was 2.7 percent more than what the workers in Cumberland County were earning in in the fourth quarter of 2016. But that wage increase trailed the national average increase, which was 3.9 percent. This means that workers in Cumberland county are earning about $5,300 per year less than the national average wage.

Workers in Maine’s most populous county are still earning more than workers in the state as a whole. Cumberland county’s average weekly wage in the fourth quarter of 2017 was $1,007. The state average was only $884 per week. But the rest of the state may be catching up. The bureau notes that, comparing last year’s fourth quarter to the fourth quarter of 2016, the state annual wage rose 3.4 percent, while wages in Cumberland County grew only 2.7 percent.