City market profile

Flagstaff, AZ OT job market

Compare Flagstaff, AZ using BLS occupational therapist wage, employment, density, and concentration data from the May 2025 OEWS release.

Metro rank #254$106,240 mean wage50 OT jobs0.74 location quotient

Market snapshot

How Flagstaff, AZ compares for occupational therapists

The OT Index city score balances pay, role depth, role density, and occupational concentration. The wage and job-market measures stay visible so readers can understand the rank.

Mean wage$106,240BLS OEWS mean annual wage for occupational therapists.
Employment50Estimated occupational therapist jobs in the metro.
Density0.78OT jobs per 1,000 local jobs.
Concentration0.74Location quotient versus the national labor market.

Our take

Flagstaff, AZ OT market assessment

Flagstaff, AZ is a role-specific choice rather than a broadly strong OT market at #254. Its case is driven by pay, not the rank alone. 50 jobs make the market thinner than the typical metro, which can limit switching options.

Why it stands out

  • Mean pay is $10,210 above the metro midpoint in this dataset. That is a real earnings advantage before any individual offer is considered.
  • 5 other Arizona metros create realistic nearby alternatives if the first offer or setting is not a fit.

Tradeoffs that matter

  • 50 estimated jobs is below the metro midpoint of 130. A thinner market can make specialty searches and employer changes harder.
  • The 0.74 location quotient shows OT is less concentrated here than in the national workforce, which weakens the case that this is an OT-centered labor market.
  • OT jobs per 1,000 workers also fall below the metro midpoint, reinforcing that local opportunity is not especially dense.

What to compare next

  • Compare Flagstaff, AZ directly with Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler, AZ: the wage and job-count gap shows whether staying in the same state materially changes your options.
  • Use the Arizona state profile to tell whether this metro is carrying the state or benefiting from a stronger market elsewhere.
  • Compare the setting mix behind the job count. A metro dominated by schools or home health may be a poor fit even when total OT employment looks healthy.

Methodology

Why this metro scores where it does

Metro rankings are most useful when the score is read beside the raw measures. A high-wage city can still have a shallow market, while a dense market can still have weaker pay.

Mean annual wage40%

BLS OEWS mean annual wage for the metro.

Employment depth25%

Log-scaled employment count so deeper markets count without letting the largest metros dominate.

Employment density20%

Occupational therapist jobs per 1,000 local jobs.

Job concentration15%

BLS location quotient, which compares the local concentration of OT jobs with the national labor market.

Nearby comparisons

Other Arizona metro markets

Compare this metro against nearby labor markets before using a single city score to make a relocation or negotiation decision.

MetroScoreMean wageEmployment
Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler, AZ

Rank #51; 0.83 LQ

51.2$105,6502,070
Tucson, AZ

Rank #168; 0.77 LQ

40.7$102,340310
Prescott Valley-Prescott, AZ

Rank #249; 0.91 LQ

35.3$99,86070
Yuma, AZ

Rank #306; 0.66 LQ

30.5$100,41050
Lake Havasu City-Kingman, AZ

Rank #314; 0.63 LQ

29.6$101,48040