Benchmarking pay trends in our industrial and commercial sectors

Pay rates are intertwined with various factors including region, age, tenure, qualifications and the size of the team, yet these variables do not automatically denote higher or lower pay across the board.

OneStaff’s comprehensive What’s My Rate? New Zealand Industrial and Trades Wage Report 2020 (produced prior to COVID-19) analysed key trends in Construction & Infrastructure, Engineering, Manufacturing, Production & Logistics, Trades & Services and Commercial & Hospitality. The report surveyed over 7,800 participants from these core industrial and commercial sectors across the country, and revealed that: • There is very little difference in the median hourly pay for people of different generations. • Pay tends to rise with tenure, though it plateaus after 6-10 years. • High-level tertiary education does not necessarily equate to higher pay. • Managing a large team is not grounds for earning more, and there is no clear trend correlating the size of the team and higher pay. • Living in a larger, more prosperous region of New Zealand does not guarantee more pay, with Northland and Otago sharing the top median rate in the country alongside Auckland and Canterbury. • There is still a gender pay gap in many industries, with women earning, on average, 17% less than their male counterparts.

COVID-19 brings a new dimension to remuneration trends in New Zealand, and as the economy shifts, it’s likely that pay rates and the correlations between them have changed as a result. Economic conditions have temporarily impacted rates of pay and hours in businesses across the country, often alongside wage subsidy schemes. There are also likely to be changes tied to restrictions on immigration that will make certain skill sets harder to find, potentially driving pay rates within these roles for the foreseeable future.

As the situation continues to evolve, it will be interesting to see how this has affected not just wage rates but the motivations of workers and sectors that have been disrupted by the economic developments.

OneStaff has created a free online tool that allows employers and workers alike to benchmark pay rates against others in their industry and region by filling out a simple survey. Results are based on multiple factors affecting pay rates in each location for each role type.

At the end of the survey, participants get immediate, personalised insights into hourly pay rates that they can use to inform career and business decisions. They will also receive a free copy of OneStaff’s full What’s My Rate? report for 2021 when it is released, providing additional information around year-on-year trends based on real data from real New Zealanders. Both employees and employers working in these sectors will find a raft of valuable insights in this industry-leading report, empowering them to effectively develop their careers and implement strategic changes within their workplaces.