WIL Compensation Profiles · Research Brief · October 2026

Construction Management and Engineering Compensation: New Jersey

A public-source statewide wage profile of New Jersey, May 2025

What construction managers, cost estimators, construction supervisors, and civil engineers earn across New Jersey — BLS OEWS percentiles benchmarked against national levels, with QCEW construction-industry wage context.

Overview

This profile reports what four core construction management and engineering occupations are paid across New Jersey, using the most recent federal occupational wage statistics. All figures are statewide annual wages in US dollars from the OEWS May 2025 reference period; statewide figures average across the state's metro and non-metro labor markets. The profile is produced under the Lab's public-source compensation benchmarking method (WIL-CBM-1.0): it is a public-data profile, not a peer survey, and it describes pay positioning only — it makes no claim about labor availability or hiring conditions.

Table 1. Annual wage distribution, New Jersey — OEWS May 2025
Occupation (SOC)10th pctileMedianMean90th pctileEmployment
Construction Managers (11-9021)$93,130$138,230$151,170$222,5806,910
Civil Engineers (17-2051)$74,640$104,660$114,750$169,2206,900
First-Line Supervisors, Construction Trades (47-1011)$63,210$105,510$107,160$153,94016,230
Cost Estimators (13-1051)$50,390$80,570$89,600$137,0805,240

Annual wages, US dollars. Employment is OEWS-estimated statewide occupational employment. — Sources: BLS

New Jersey · OEWS May 2025
Median annual wage by occupation
US dollars, thousands. Public-source federal statistics — pay positioning, not an availability measure.

Scroll horizontally to read the full chart →

Median annual wage by occupationBar chart: Constr. Managers 138.2; Constr. Supervisors 105.5; Civil Engineers 104.7; Cost Estimators 80.6, on a 0–140 scale.03570105140Constr. Managers138.2Constr.Supervisors105.5Civil Engineers104.7Cost Estimators80.6

Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS), May 2025 — New Jersey; United States · Methodology WIL-CBM-1.0 · Public-source federal statistics. Annual wages in US dollars; OEWS estimates are modeled from employer surveys and carry published relative standard errors.

Table 2. Median annual wage — New Jersey vs. the United States, with national rank, OEWS May 2025
OccupationNew JerseyUnited Statesvs. USRank (of 49)
Construction Managers$138,230$114,990+20.2%4th
Civil Engineers$104,660$100,840+3.8%6th
First-Line Supervisors$105,510$79,920+32.0%3rd
Cost Estimators$80,570$78,740+2.3%14th

Percentages computed from OEWS medians as shown. Rank is the state's position among the 48 continental states and the District of Columbia (1 = highest median). — Sources: BLS

What the figures show

Among the 48 continental states and the District of Columbia, New Jersey ranks 4th of 49 for construction-manager median pay ($138,230), 6th for civil engineers ($104,660), 3rd for construction supervisors ($105,510), and 14th for cost estimators ($80,570). All four occupational medians stand above the national median. Industry-wide, New Jersey's private construction average weekly wage moved from $1,685 to $1,741 between Q3 2024 and Q3 2025 (+3.3%), with employment at 168,929 (+0.5% year over year). These are observed pay comparisons only; nothing here measures how hard these roles are to fill.

Table 3. Industry context — New Jersey private construction (NAICS 23), QCEW
QuarterAvg weekly wageEmploymentEstablishments
2024 Q3$1,685168,11622,106
2025 Q3$1,741168,92922,168

Statewide, all occupations within private NAICS 23 — broader than the four profiled occupations. Year over year: average weekly wage +3.3%; employment +0.5%. Quarterly wages are not seasonally adjusted. — Sources: BLS

Method and limitations

Prepared under WIL-CBM-1.0 (Public-Source Compensation Benchmarking: A Method Note, WIL-RB-2026.3-COMP-METHOD). Wage figures are BLS OEWS May 2025 estimates for New Jersey and the United States, read from the Lab's governed warehouse (BLS_OEWS ingest, June 2026); industry context is BLS QCEW, private ownership, NAICS 23 (BLS_QCEW ingest, June 2026). Limitations: this is a public-data profile, not a peer survey — no employer-specific comparators were collected, so it does not substitute for a WIL-CBM-1.0 peer study where employer-level matching is required. Coverage is four occupations at the statewide level; metro- or employer-level variation within the state is not shown here. OEWS wages are modeled estimates with published relative standard errors; QCEW quarterly wages are not seasonally adjusted. Suppressed or unavailable cells are shown as missing — never zero. This profile asserts pay positioning only — not workforce availability, not hiring conditions.

State workforce context — New Jersey

A live public-signal read for New Jersey from the Lab's standing trackers — banded and directional, refreshed independently of this brief.

Workforce exposure
Moderate
Exposure movement
stable
Wage position
material premium over national medians
Federal-award momentum
Elevated · softening

Source: Workforce Exposure Index and federal-award momentum — public_reports (banded). Directional, banded read — not a forecast. Methodology v2 · last updated 2026-05-26. See Live metrics for the full charts.

Suggested citationAlphaHire Workforce Intelligence Lab. (2026). Construction Management and Engineering Compensation: New Jersey: A public-source statewide wage profile of New Jersey, May 2025 (Publication No. WIL-RB-2026.4-COMP-ST-NJ, Version 1.0). WIL Compensation Profiles.

Version 1.0 · Published 2026-10-01T13:00:00Z · Permanent ID WIL-RB-2026.4-COMP-ST-NJ. This record is versioned; the URL is permanent and stable for citation.

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BibTeX
@techreport{WILRB20264COMPSTNJ,
  title       = {Construction Management and Engineering Compensation: New Jersey: A public-source statewide wage profile of New Jersey, May 2025},
  author      = {AlphaHire Workforce Intelligence Lab},
  institution = {AlphaHire Workforce Intelligence Lab},
  type        = {WIL Compensation Profiles},
  number      = {WIL-RB-2026.4-COMP-ST-NJ},
  year        = {2026},
  note        = {Version 1.0; methodology WIL-CBM-1.0},
  url         = {https://wilinstitute.org/library/p/compensation-profile-construction-management-new-jersey},
}
RIS
TY  - RPRT
AU  - AlphaHire Workforce Intelligence Lab
TI  - Construction Management and Engineering Compensation: New Jersey: A public-source statewide wage profile of New Jersey, May 2025
PY  - 2026
PB  - AlphaHire Workforce Intelligence Lab
M1  - WIL-RB-2026.4-COMP-ST-NJ
ET  - Version 1.0
UR  - https://wilinstitute.org/library/p/compensation-profile-construction-management-new-jersey
AB  - A public-source compensation profile of four construction management and engineering occupations in New Jersey, using BLS OEWS May 2025 wage percentiles benchmarked against national levels, with BLS QCEW private construction (NAICS 23) industry context. The state ranks 3rd of 49 for construction supervisors median pay. Prepared under methodology WIL-CBM-1.0; this is a public-data profile, not a peer survey.
ER  -