2026 Edition · An annual reference on what work pays

Heating, Air Conditioning, and Refrigeration Mechanics and Installers

Albany-Schenectady-Troy, NY metropolitan area. Estimated employment 1,450.

Data released May 2025 BLS OEWS · SOC 49-9021
Fig. 1 — The wage rule

Where you sit in the distribution

Drag the marker, or type a figure
$66,040 · 50th
$47,51010th
$56,16025th
$66,04050th
$78,59075th
$97,81090th

That is the medianhalf of people in this occupation in Albany earn more.

Table 1 — Adjusted

$66,040 in Albany buys what $66,300 buys across the country as a whole.

Albany's regional price parity is 99.6 — almost exactly the national average — the nominal figure is close to the real one here, which is not true of most large metros. Adjusted figures for other metros are in the nearby-metros table below.

Table 2 — Nearby metros

The same job, elsewhere in New York

Adjusted figures apply each metro's regional price parity, so the columns are directly comparable.

Metro areaMedianAdjustedRPPvs. Albany
New York$77,990$69,300112.6+4.5%
Syracuse$66,600$69,60095.7+4.9%
Albany This page$66,040$66,30099.6
Kiryas Joel$65,530$59,900109.4−9.7%
Ithaca$64,690$62,600103.3−5.6%
Rochester$63,570$65,50097.0−1.2%
Watertown$62,850$71,70087.7+8.1%
Elmira$62,400$66,10094.4−0.3%

Price parity and difference against Albany are in the full table on wider screens.

Fig. 2 — Five-year trend

Nominal against real

The same median, once as published and once restated in 2025 dollars.

60k65k70k75k 20212022202320242025
Nominal, as published Real, in 2025 dollars US$ thousands

Published pay rose 9.3% over the five years to 2025. Adjusted for inflation it fell 8.0% — prices rose faster than pay since 2021. The two lines meet at the right edge by construction, since 2025 is the base year.

Sources

How this page was made

Wage data
Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025 release. Public domain.
Price parity
Bureau of Economic Analysis, Regional Price Parities, 2024.
Inflation
Real figures deflate by CPI-U annual averages (BLS, all items, US city average).
Employment
1,450 employed in this occupation in the metro (BLS estimate; excludes the self-employed).
Occupation
SOC 49-9021, Heating, Air Conditioning, and Refrigeration Mechanics and Installers. Mapped to our taxonomy as heating-air-conditioning-and-refrigeration-mechanics-and-installers.

Percentiles are reported exactly as released and are never interpolated between published values. We take no payment from employers, recruiters or anyone else for how any figure is presented.