Occupational employment and wages in oil and gas industries, May 2024

Employment in industries related to oil and gas extends well beyond extracting the natural resources from the ground. They must also be transported away from the extraction site, distributed to businesses and consumers, and transformed into other products, which leads to substantial employment levels in a number of related industries. This article examines data from the May 2024 Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) survey for five “oil and gas” industries: oil and gas extraction, support activities for mining, pipeline transportation, natural gas distribution, and petroleum and coal products manufacturing. The article compares employment and wages for various occupational groups for each of the five industries. Together, the five industries had 672,010 jobs in May 2024 and tended to pay higher wages than all industries combined, even in the same occupational categories. Jobs related to oil and gas are not limited to extracting these natural resources from the ground.