Occupation / job
Packers and Packagers, Hand
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 a $36,280 midpoint, Packers and Packagers, Hand sits 27% under the $50,020 national figure. The shortfall is $1,145 a month, which is roughly the size of a rent difference between metros — worth checking before the job is the thing you blame.
559,820 people work as Packers and Packagers, Hand — large enough that the occupation is always hiring somewhere and always losing people somewhere else. Constant demand is security; it is rarely leverage.
These roles suit people who prefer to be busy physically rather than sat still, and who value being able to find the same job in any city.
We carry no verified training length for Packers and Packagers, Hand — BLS reports pay, not preparation, and we will not estimate it.
Who should not do this
$10,840 separates the bottom quarter at $32,220 from the top quarter at $43,060, a ratio of 1.3x. In a band that tight, moving up inside Packers and Packagers, Hand pays less than moving out of it would.
Under $32,220 is where a quarter of this field sits, $17,800 beneath the $50,020 a typical American job pays. The risk in Packers and Packagers, Hand is not the average outcome, it is how long you might spend in the bottom quarter before leaving it.
Avoid it if repetitive lifting would be unsustainable, or if you need pay that rises meaningfully with time served.
You will not find a "what share make it" figure here. 559,820 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 1.3x ratio from $32,220 to $43,060 makes $36,280 a dependable planning number. Dependable is the whole offer here — there is not much room above it.
Put in money rather than ratios: $32,220 at the 25th percentile, $36,280 at the midpoint, $43,060 at the 75th. $10,840 separates the quarter of Packers and Packagers, Hand at the bottom from the quarter at the top.
The 75th percentile is $43,060. Reaching it from the $36,280 midpoint is $6,780 a year; reaching it from the $32,220 that the bottom quarter of Packers and Packagers, Hand earn is $10,840.
It is $4,060 from $36,280 down to $32,220 but $6,780 up to $43,060. When a range leans this far upward, the interesting question is what puts someone in the top half, because the money is disproportionately there.
Converted to an hourly rate over a full-time year: $15.49 at the bottom quarter, $17.44 at the midpoint, $20.70 at the top quarter. The typical American job works out at $24.04 on the same basis.
What these figures are, and what they are not
The $36,280 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.
Treat the per-hour figure as a conversion. It assumes a flat full-time year against $36,280 because we have no verified record of unpaid hours or out-of-pocket costs for this work, and we would rather convert honestly than adjust invented ones.
How this is calculated · Self-employment failure rates · What credentials cost and pay back · Look up something else