Occupation / job
Animal Control Workers
Median annual pay. Half earn less than this.
Hourly at a standard 2,080-hour year. We do not yet have unpaid-time or cost data for this, so this is not an adjusted figure.
The middle half. A quarter earn below this range.
Source: BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025 · view
What this figure cannot tell you
It covers people EMPLOYED in this occupation. Anyone who trained for it and was never hired is not in the median above, and neither is anyone doing the work self-employed. No verified count of qualified people exists for this occupation, so this page shows none rather than an estimate. Why that matters · The occupations where we could source it
Who this suits
At $45,660, Animal Control Workers lands just under the $50,020 national midpoint — $4,360 apart, inside the range a single promotion or a move between states closes.
12,070 people work as Animal Control Workers. That is enough for a functioning national market and not enough for a functioning local one — in most metros this is a few employers rather than a field you can move around inside.
These roles suit people who can be reliably present and observant for a whole shift, in work where nothing happening is the intended outcome.
We carry no verified training length for Animal Control Workers — BLS reports pay, not preparation, and we will not estimate it.
Who should not do this
A quarter earn below $37,750 and a quarter above $57,060: a 1.5x ratio, $19,310 between the ends. That is an ordinary working spread, which also means experience and location explain most of it and there is no shortcut through the middle.
A quarter of Animal Control Workers earn under $37,750, which is $12,270 short of the $50,020 national midpoint. Assume you start there and check whether the arithmetic still works.
Avoid it if long, uneventful shifts would be hard to stay sharp through — that is the actual difficulty of the job.
You will not find a "what share make it" figure here. 12,070 is a headcount of the employed, which is a numerator without a denominator — everyone who qualified and never got hired is missing from it, and we will not estimate them to complete a percentage.
What the spread tells you
1.5x between $37,750 and $57,060 is the ordinary shape of an occupation where experience and region both matter and neither dominates. $45,660 is a fair expectation by mid-career, not on day one.
The middle half of this field earns between $37,750 and $57,060. That is $19,310 of range, with $45,660 sitting inside it as the point half the field is above and half below.
The 75th percentile is $57,060. Reaching it from the $45,660 midpoint is $11,400 a year; reaching it from the $37,750 that the bottom quarter of Animal Control Workers earn is $19,310.
The climb from $45,660 to $57,060 is $11,400, against $7,910 down to $37,750. Rather more of the range sits above the midpoint than below it, so the realistic upside in Animal Control Workers is larger than the realistic downside.
Per hour at a standard full-time year that is $21.95 at the midpoint for Animal Control Workers, $18.14 at the 25th percentile and $27.43 at the 75th, against $24.04 for the typical American job.
What these figures are, and what they are not
Employers reported these wages for people already working as Animal Control Workers. The self-employed are excluded, so $45,660 does not describe an independent doing the same work.
The hourly number on this page is $45,660 divided by a 2,080-hour year and nothing more. We hold no unpaid-hours or cost data for Animal Control Workers, so it is arithmetic rather than an effective rate.
How this is calculated · Self-employment failure rates · What credentials cost and pay back · Look up something else