Occupation / job
Log Graders and Scalers
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 $46,330, Log Graders and Scalers lands just under the $50,020 national midpoint — $3,690 apart, inside the range a single promotion or a move between states closes.
National employment of 3,070 makes this a small field. Small fields are relationship markets: the people already in Log Graders and Scalers tend to know who is hiring before the posting exists.
Forestry, conservation and logging suit people who want to work outdoors in remote places and are serious about the safety discipline the equipment demands.
No verified preparation time is on file for Log Graders and Scalers. The wage survey behind every figure on this page asks employers what they pay, not what they required, so the honest answer here is that we do not know.
Who should not do this
Between $37,780 and $56,250 there is $18,470, a ratio of 1.5x. Tight distributions are predictable, and predictable cuts both ways: little risk of being badly underpaid, little prospect of doing much better.
A quarter of Log Graders and Scalers earn under $37,780, which is $12,240 short of the $50,020 national midpoint. Assume you start there and check whether the arithmetic still works.
Avoid it if remote work sites and a genuinely elevated injury risk are not acceptable terms for you.
There is no failure rate on this page because there is nothing honest to divide by. BLS counted 3,070 people employed as Log Graders and Scalers; it did not count the people who trained for it and are doing something else, and a rate built without that denominator would be a number we made up.
What the spread tells you
The quarters are $37,780 and $56,250, a ratio of 1.5x. In a distribution this narrow, the biggest single lever on your pay in Log Graders and Scalers is the cost of living where you do it.
Put in money rather than ratios: $37,780 at the 25th percentile, $46,330 at the midpoint, $56,250 at the 75th. $18,470 separates the quarter of Log Graders and Scalers at the bottom from the quarter at the top.
The 75th percentile is $56,250. Reaching it from the $46,330 midpoint is $9,920 a year; reaching it from the $37,780 that the bottom quarter of Log Graders and Scalers earn is $18,470.
The climb from $46,330 to $56,250 is $9,920; the drop to $37,780 is $8,550. A little more room above the midpoint than below it is the normal shape for Log Graders and Scalers and for most paid work, and it is the reason the median is the honest summary rather than the average.
On a 2,080-hour year the midpoint for Log Graders and Scalers is $22.27 an hour. The quarters sit at $18.16 and $27.04, and the all-occupation midpoint at $24.04.
What these figures are, and what they are not
This is payroll data: it comes from employers, about people they employ. Anyone doing the work of Log Graders and Scalers for themselves is not in it, and there is no reason to assume $46,330 describes them.
With no unpaid-hours or cost data for Log Graders and Scalers, the hourly figure is $46,330 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