Occupation / job
Financial and Investment Analysts
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 $102,740 against a $50,020 national midpoint, Financial and Investment Analysts pays 105% more than the typical American job — $52,720 a year of difference. Read the entry requirements before the number.
361,980 people do this work. An occupation this large has a published, well-known going rate — which means less scope to be underpaid and less scope to negotiate above it.
These roles suit people who are comfortable being the check on someone else’s numbers, and who can say so plainly when the numbers do not hold.
We carry no verified training length for Financial and Investment Analysts — BLS reports pay, not preparation, and we will not estimate it.
Who should not do this
From $79,290 to $133,340 is $4,504 a month, or 1.7x bottom quarter to top. An ordinary spread like this is mostly years and geography; assume you enter near the bottom of it and that closing the gap takes a career rather than a move.
The bottom quarter of this field earns $79,290 — $38.12 an hour, $29,270 above the $50,020 national midpoint. When even the worst-paid quarter of Financial and Investment Analysts is this far ahead, the barrier to entry is doing the work of keeping it there.
Avoid it if repetitive detail work drains you; the quarter-end and year-end cycles are non-negotiable and immovable.
You will not find a "what share make it" figure here. 361,980 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
A 1.7x ratio is the most common shape in this data: some room to move, none of it quick. Read $102,740 as where you might be after years in Financial and Investment Analysts, and $79,290 as where you would start.
In cash terms the middle half of Financial and Investment Analysts runs $79,290 to $133,340 — $54,050 a year between the 25th and 75th percentiles, against a midpoint of $102,740.
The 75th percentile is $133,340. Reaching it from the $102,740 midpoint is $30,600 a year; reaching it from the $79,290 that the bottom quarter of Financial and Investment Analysts earn is $54,050.
The climb from $102,740 to $133,340 is $30,600; the drop to $79,290 is $23,450. A little more room above the midpoint than below it is the normal shape for Financial and Investment Analysts and for most paid work, and it is the reason the median is the honest summary rather than the average.
Per hour at a standard full-time year that is $49.39 at the midpoint for Financial and Investment Analysts, $38.12 at the 25th percentile and $64.10 at the 75th, against $24.04 for the typical American job.
What these figures are, and what they are not
The $102,740 figure is what employers pay employees. It is before tax and before deductions, it excludes the self-employed entirely, and it says nothing about anyone who does this work on their own account.
With no unpaid-hours or cost data for Financial and Investment Analysts, the hourly figure is $102,740 over a 2,080-hour year — a unit conversion, not an adjustment.
How this is calculated · Self-employment failure rates · What credentials cost and pay back · Look up something else