A state-by-state, county-by-county, year-over-year look at pay, employment, safety, and pricing across America's waste industry — powered by live queries to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Find out where refuse collectors out-earn long-haul truckers, which counties are hiring the most, how dangerous the job really is, and what you'd be worth in your own state.
SOC code 53-7081 — Refuse and Recyclable Material Collectors covers roll-off operators, residential pickup drivers, and curbside sorters. Here's what federal data says about them in 2024.
Refuse collection is an essential-service, inflation-resistant, and often unionized occupation that sits at the intersection of municipal government, private hauling, and recycling. It is also one of the ten most dangerous civilian occupations in America — a fact that helps explain why wages have climbed faster than general private-sector pay over the past decade.
Toggle between mean annual pay, hourly median, the top-10 percent of earners, and employment counts. Hover any state for its full wage distribution.
Click any state on the map above to drill into its metros. Below: the top-20 paying MSAs nationally and the bottom-5, pulled from the BLS 2024 OEWS metropolitan-area bundle. Bay Area metros dominate the top — a direct reflection of cost-of-living-adjusted municipal bargaining power.
| Metropolitan Area | State | Employed | Mean annual | Median | 90th pct | Hourly median |
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Nominal mean annual wage change for SOC 53-7081 from May 2019 to May 2024, pulled directly from the BLS OEWS state archive. The pattern isn't random — states with the lowest wages five years ago posted the biggest gains, while the traditional high-pay coastal markets barely kept up with inflation.
Between 2019 and 2024, the states that paid refuse collectors the least (Mississippi, South Carolina, Indiana) saw nominal wage growth of +50% or more. The states that paid the most (Connecticut, New York, Illinois) barely moved — some actually declined in nominal terms. Labor-market tightness, minimum-wage legislation, and union catch-up all played a role, but the dominant driver is pure gravity: wages in low-cost states are pulling toward the national mean as firms compete for a shrinking pool of willing workers.
Every state, every percentile. Sort by any column. Search for a specific state or filter to a pay band.
| State | Employed | Mean annual | 10th pct | Median | 90th pct | Hourly median |
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County-level establishment and employment data for NAICS 5621 (Waste Collection), sourced from the BLS Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW) Open Data API. This is the only federal source with true county-level coverage of the waste industry.
Average establishment size — total industry employment divided by establishment count — tells you how consolidated each state's waste market is. Low averages mean lots of small operators (ripe for rollup). High averages mean a few large haulers dominate.
Avg establishment size (smallest)
Avg establishment size (largest)
Share of NAICS 5621 employment in private firms (vs. municipal sanitation departments).
Year-over-year change in waste-collection establishment counts, 2023 → 2024, from the BLS QCEW. Growth states signal fragmenting markets with new entrants; declining states signal consolidation (fewer, larger firms).
CurbWaste was built by industry veterans who understand the difficulties of running a waste business firsthand. Our all-in-one software platform handles customer management, dispatch, and billing, so you can focus on the things that matter: service, speed, and scaling your business.
GET DEMOFederal data shows that the pay relationship between refuse collectors (53-7081) and heavy/tractor-trailer drivers (53-3032) flips state by state. Coastal and unionized markets favor refuse; inland and open-shop markets favor trucking.
Refuse collection is a route-and-location job — work cannot be shipped out of state, and municipalities set pay floors through collective bargaining and contract terms. Long-haul trucking is a national labor pool — wages normalize toward federal rate-per-mile economics regardless of where the truck is domiciled. The result: in high-cost-of-living or highly unionized markets, refuse collectors close the gap on — and frequently pass — heavy truckers.
Fatal work-injury rate per 100,000 full-time-equivalent workers, by occupation. Source: BLS Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries (CFOI), Table 5, 2022–2023 combined.
On-the-job death risk is the single biggest wage-premium driver in this occupation. Collectors face vehicle strikes (by passing traffic and by their own trucks), slips-and-falls from the truck step, and hydraulic compactor injuries. In 2022–2023 alone, the CFOI recorded 46 refuse collector fatalities — on a workforce of roughly 140,000, that's one in every 3,000 workers killed each year.
The next time someone pushes back on municipal trash-contract renewals, this chart is the answer to "why does it cost so much?"
Compare 2024 mean annual wages for seven occupations that share labor pools with waste hauling. Pick a state to see how the stack shifts.
Pick a state and pay tier to see a live estimate based on 2024 BLS OEWS percentile data. Tier = 10th percentile (new hire), 50th (median / experienced), or 90th (senior / supervisor / union top).
Monthly BLS Current Employment Statistics (CES) for NAICS 562 — Waste Management and Remediation Services — fetched live from the BLS public API on every page load.
api.bls.gov...api.bls.gov...The Bureau of Labor Statistics Employment Projections program publishes 10-year forecasts every two years. The most recent vintage (released September 2025) covers 2024→2034. Here's where refuse collection and adjacent trades sit.
Every number on this page is sourced directly from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. No proprietary estimates, no interpolation. All data is in the public domain.
bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesmXXst.zip.
CES6056200001 for NAICS 562. Fetched live from the API on each page load.
PCU562111562111 for Solid Waste Collection. Monthly, 2005–present. Captures what B2B and municipal customers actually pay.
bls.gov/iif/.
CurbWaste was built by industry veterans who understand the difficulties of running a waste business firsthand. Our all-in-one software platform handles customer management, dispatch, and billing, so you can focus on the things that matter: service, speed, and scaling your business.
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