Salary Range Methodology Resource Hub
Your starting point for everything on salary range methodology — from reading BLS data to setting range spreads and visualizing pay bands.
Rovaryn Digital · June 27, 2026
Start Here: What This Hub Is and Who It's For
You have a job posting that needs a salary range — or an attorney who needs to see how you built the ones you already posted. Either way, you need a methodology: a documented, repeatable process that connects a specific wage source to a specific number in a specific posting.
That is what this hub is for.
Every guide collected here covers one discrete piece of salary range methodology — the kind of methodology an HR Manager or People Operations lead at a 25-to-100-person company can build and defend without a dedicated compensation analyst. The resources run from first principles (what a percentile actually means; how to read a BLS wage table) through applied decisions (how wide should this band be; how do I adjust for location; how do I visualize five job families on one page) to the Canadian side of the equation (how Statistics Canada NOC data works and how it compares to the U.S. BLS approach).
Work through them in order if you are starting from zero. Use the section navigation below if you need a specific answer fast.
By the end of this hub you will know how to anchor a salary range in authoritative wage data, set a defensible range spread, calculate a midpoint, apply a geographic differential, and document every step — whether you are posting under a U.S. state pay-transparency law or a Canadian provincial requirement.
Section 1: The Foundation — Anchoring a Range in Wage Data
A salary range — or pay band — is defined by three numbers: a minimum, a midpoint, and a maximum. Every number in that band traces back to a wage anchor: a data point from an authoritative external source that tells you what the labor market actually pays for this occupation in this geography.
The two authoritative public sources for that anchor are:
BLS OEWS (Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics) — the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics program that estimates wages for over 800 occupations nationally, by state, and by metropolitan area, constructed from a sample of approximately 1.1 million establishments (BLS, May 2025). Wages are reported at five percentiles: 10th, 25th, 50th, 75th, and 90th. The 50th percentile — the median, or the wage below which half of all workers in that occupation and geography earn — is the most common anchor for a midpoint calculation.
Statistics Canada Employee Wages by Occupation (NOC) — the Canadian equivalent, organized under the National Occupational Classification system. NOC codes and U.S. Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) codes are different taxonomies and must never be treated as equivalent. Canadian figures are in Canadian dollars (CAD); U.S. figures are in U.S. dollars (USD). The two series are always presented separately.
These two sources, used correctly, are the foundation of every other concept in this hub. Start here:
How to Read BLS OEWS Data — A plain-English walkthrough of the BLS OEWS tables: what each column means, how to filter by geography and SOC code, and which percentile to use as your anchor.
Percentile Wages Explained — Defines the five OEWS percentiles, shows what each one tells you about the labor market, and explains when to anchor at the 50th versus the 75th.
Statistics Canada NOC Wage Data Guide — How to navigate the NOC dataset for British Columbia and Ontario postings, what the data covers, and how to document it. Includes the mandatory attribution requirement for any use of Statistics Canada data.
Source note for Statistics Canada content: Statistics Canada, Employee Wages by Occupation (NOC). Reproduced and distributed on an "as is" basis with the permission of Statistics Canada.
Section 2: Building the Band — Range Spread and Midpoint
Once you have a wage anchor, you need to turn it into a band. Two concepts govern that step: range spread and midpoint.
Range spread is how wide the band is, expressed as a percentage of the band's minimum. A spread of 50% means the maximum is 50% higher than the minimum. A spread of 80% means there is room for a more senior or longer-tenured employee to earn significantly more than a new hire entering at the bottom of the same band. Range spread is not arbitrary — it typically varies by job family, level, and the degree of skill variation within the role.
Midpoint is the center of the band: the wage that represents fully-competent, fully-productive performance at market rate for the role. In a correctly structured band, the midpoint should approximate your wage anchor (usually the BLS median for the occupation and geography). The midpoint is also the denominator in two downstream metrics: compa-ratio (an individual employee's salary divided by the midpoint, expressed as a percentage — a reading of 1.00 means the employee is paid exactly at market) and range penetration (how far through the band an employee sits, from 0% at the minimum to 100% at the maximum).
These three guides cover the build in detail:
How to Build a Salary Range — The end-to-end methodology: selecting a wage anchor, applying a range spread, calculating the min/mid/max, and formatting the output for a compliant posting. The most-linked guide in this hub.
What Is Range Spread? — Explains what range spread measures, how to calculate it, and how to choose a spread that fits the role's seniority and skill variance.
Salary Range Midpoint Explained — Defines midpoint, shows how it relates to the BLS median and to compa-ratio, and explains what it means when employees cluster above or below it.
If you need a structured template to work through these calculations without building one from scratch, the Salary Range Builder Workbook (Excel) walks through each step with pre-built formulas, BLS data entry fields, and a documentation layer you can export for audit or counsel review.
Section 3: Adjusting for Location — Geographic Differentials and Multi-Location Sets
A salary range anchored to a national BLS median is a starting point, not a finished product. Labor markets vary substantially by geography — the market rate for a software developer in San Francisco is not the same as in Columbus or Charlotte, and a British Columbia employer cannot use a U.S. national figure for a Canadian posting.
Geographic differential — also called a location factor or geographic pay adjustment — is the ratio of a local or metro-area wage estimate to the national median for the same occupation. BLS OEWS publishes state-level and metropolitan statistical area (MSA) estimates alongside national figures, so you can compute this ratio directly from the data: if the national median for an occupation is $80,000 and the state median is $92,000, the location factor for that state is 1.15.
When a role can be filled by remote workers across multiple states, each triggering its own pay-transparency posting requirement, you may need a multi-location range set — a defined band for each covered geography, documented in a single methodology record.
Geographic Pay Differentials Explained — How location factors work, how to calculate them from BLS OEWS state and MSA data, and how to document the adjustment in your methodology record.
Location-Based Range Sets Guide — Covers the specific challenge of building and maintaining separate ranges for multiple geographies: when you need them, how to structure them, and how to keep them synchronized as BLS data releases annually.
Section 4: Structuring Multiple Roles — Job Families, Salary Bands, and Salary Grades
Building one salary range is a methodology problem. Building ranges for twenty roles across five job families is a compensation architecture problem. Two structures dominate in organizations with 25–200 employees:
- Salary bands — broad, overlapping ranges that group multiple levels or roles. They offer flexibility and are easier to maintain with a small HR team, but require more judgment in individual pay decisions.
- Salary grades — narrower, sequential tiers with defined steps. They are more rigid but easier to explain to employees and to document for equity review.
Range spread by job family adds another layer: the appropriate band width is typically narrower for entry-level, highly standardized roles (where there is less skill variance between workers) and wider for senior, specialized, or leadership roles (where the performance gap between a new hire and a veteran can be very large).
These three guides cover the architecture decisions:
Salary Bands vs. Salary Grades — A direct comparison: when each structure fits, how to choose between them, and how to migrate from an ad-hoc system to either one.
Range Spread by Job Family — How to set different spreads for different role categories — administrative, professional, technical, managerial — and why a single spread across all job families produces distorted bands at the edges.
Pay Band Visualization Guide — How to display multiple bands clearly: stacked bar formats, overlap zones, and how to annotate bands for an executive or board presentation without turning a compensation summary into a spreadsheet archaeology project.
Section 5: Putting It Together — The Methodology Record
A salary range posted under a pay-transparency law is not just a number. It is a representation that the employer can explain, defend, and reproduce. Pay-transparency enforcement in jurisdictions like Colorado, California, New York, Washington, Illinois, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Washington D.C., British Columbia, and Ontario all point toward the same practical requirement: if a posted range is questioned — by a regulator, a job applicant, or your own employment counsel — you need to show your work.
A methodology record is the documentation that connects a posted range to its inputs: the wage source, the release year, the geography, the percentile used as an anchor, the range spread applied, and the rationale for any adjustments. It is the difference between a defensible posting and an unexplained number.
Every guide in this hub contributes a piece of that record. The full methodology — anchor, spread, midpoint, geographic adjustment, and documentation — is the output of working through these resources in sequence. The salary range methodology resources collected here are designed to produce exactly that output: a documented, repeatable process you can hand to counsel or reproduce for the next hiring cycle without starting from scratch.
Before acting on any pay-transparency law requirements described in the resources above, verify the current rule — including covered employer thresholds, required disclosures, effective dates, and penalty ranges — directly with the relevant issuing authority: the Colorado CDLE, the NY State DOL or NYC Commission on Human Rights, California DIR, Washington L&I, Illinois IDOL, New Jersey DOL, Massachusetts AGO, Washington D.C. OHR, the BC Pay Transparency office, or the Ontario Ministry of Labour. Rules change, and the authoritative current text lives at the issuing agency, not in a blog post.
What to Read First
If you are new to compensation methodology, the recommended reading order is:
- Percentile Wages Explained — understand the data before you use it
- How to Read BLS OEWS Data — find the right number for your occupation and geography
- How to Build a Salary Range — build the band end to end
- What Is Range Spread? — calibrate band width to the role
- Salary Range Midpoint Explained — understand what the center of the band tells you
- Geographic Pay Differentials Explained — adjust for location
- Salary Bands vs. Salary Grades — choose an architecture as you scale
Canadian employers posting under British Columbia or Ontario requirements should add Statistics Canada NOC Wage Data Guide after step two.
Stay Current — New Guides, BLS Release Dates, and Law Updates
BLS OEWS data releases annually. Pay-transparency laws add jurisdictions, lower employer thresholds, and revise penalty schedules every legislative cycle. Keeping your salary ranges current is not a one-time project — it is a recurring one.
Subscribe to the Salary Range Builder newsletter for a short alert every time a new methodology guide publishes, every time a major BLS OEWS release drops, and every time a significant pay-transparency law change affects the jurisdictions you post in. No marketing cadence — only substantive updates that affect what you post and how you document it.
Get new guides in your inbox
One email when a new article goes live. Unsubscribe with one click.
