You may know what jobs are the best paid in general, but some roles have much higher salaries in particular parts of the country. Career.io checked out the pay premiums for hundreds of roles in every state to find the jobs with the biggest pay hike from one place to another. But what jobs that pay more in Arizona than any other state?

LEARN MORE: 17 inventions that haven’t been invented yet (that people want)

If you’re lucky enough to know the career you want and your way into it, you may find yourself with one more question: where to do it.

Gravitating to an industry hotspot, such as Silicon Valley for tech, might seem inevitable. But that can quickly make you a small fish in a big pond. It can make more sense to work in a town you love, or to make an impact in a lesser-known, up-and-coming industry hub — particularly in an age when professional networks are so distributed.

You might also consider regional variations in pay. We know that Bozeman, Montana, has the highest-paying entry-level jobs and that states that raise their minimum wage slow the flow of poorer workers to neighboring markets. But how about the occupations themselves — how does pay vary for the same job depending on what side of the state line you’re on?We sourced occupational salaries from every state and the biggest metro areas to find out.

What we did

To learn about the jobs that pay more in Arizona than any other state, the team at Career.io used the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ latest wage estimates to calculate which job pays the highest average salary relative to the national average wage for that job in each U.S. state and the most populated metro areas.

Key findings

  • In New York, Crane and Tower Operators are paid +109.03% over the national average for the role.
  • In California, Craft Artists are paid +89.06% more than the national average.
  • Wisconsin’s Gambling and Sports Book Writers and Runners have the biggest local wage premium of all — earning +216.19% over the national average.
  • Models in the Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim metropolitan area earn +144.02% over the national average.

The jobs that pay higher salaries in each state compared to the rest of the U.S.

Every state has at least one occupation that pays at least 25% more than the national average for that occupation. We’ve created two maps, with the first and second most disproportionately well-paid job in each state. Among the number one jobs, we found two that pay double and two that pay triple the national average.