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What the national Underground Mining Machine Operators, All Other median says
The May 2025 BLS OEWS estimate puts the U.S. median for Underground Mining Machine Operators, All Other at $70,130 per year. Median means the middle. Half of the wage values used for this estimate fall below that point. Half fall above it. The median is not one worker's pay. It is not a job offer. It is one clear mark for the middle of a broad national pay range.
BLS also lists 3,180 wage and salary jobs for Underground Mining Machine Operators, All Other. That count covers jobs in the survey's scope. It does not count open job ads. It also leaves out people who work for themselves. The wage and job counts share the same May 2025 reference point, so they can be read together without mixing time periods.
The Underground Mining Machine Operators, All Other mean of $69,860 per year is 0.4% below the $70,130 median on the same published median. Mean means BLS adds the wage values and divides the total by the number of jobs behind the estimate. A gap between mean and median shows that the shape is not even. It does not explain the cause of the gap.
Evidence: bls-oews-may-2025 · Rule: oews-national-row · median-middle-rule · mean-median-difference
