Market Research Analysts and Marketing Specialists
Santa Maria-Santa Barbara, CA metropolitan area. Estimated employment 960.
Where you sit in the distribution
That is the median — half of people in this occupation in Santa Maria earn more.
$79,710 in Santa Maria buys what $73,300 buys across the country as a whole.
Santa Maria's regional price parity is 108.8 — well above the national average — a dollar here buys noticeably less than in the US as a whole. Adjusted figures for other metros are in the nearby-metros table below.
The same job, elsewhere in California
Adjusted figures apply each metro's regional price parity, so the columns are directly comparable.
| Metro area | Median | Adjusted | RPP | vs. Santa Maria |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| San Jose | $141,960 | $128,600 | 110.4 | +75.5% |
| San Francisco | $123,250 | $106,600 | 115.6 | +45.5% |
| Los Angeles | $82,990 | $73,100 | 113.6 | −0.3% |
| Napa | $81,440 | $72,400 | 112.6 | −1.2% |
| Oxnard | $80,100 | $72,500 | 110.5 | −1.1% |
| Santa Maria This page | $79,710 | $73,300 | 108.8 | — |
| San Diego | $79,440 | $71,000 | 111.9 | −3.1% |
| Santa Cruz | $78,880 | $71,800 | 109.9 | −2.0% |
Price parity and difference against Santa Maria are in the full table on wider screens.
Nominal against real
The same median, once as published and once restated in 2025 dollars.
Published pay rose 19.4% over the five years to 2025. Adjusted for inflation it is roughly flat — people in this occupation in Santa Maria earn about what they earned in 2021. The two lines meet at the right edge by construction, since 2025 is the base year.
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
- 960 employed in this occupation in the metro (BLS estimate; excludes the self-employed).
- Occupation
- SOC 13-1161, Market Research Analysts and Marketing Specialists. Mapped to our taxonomy as market-research-analysts-and-marketing-specialists.
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.