City of Chicago / Sanitation Laborer
Role across City of Chicago
Sanitation Laborer
Operate, maintain, and repair equipment or facilities, performing skilled hands-on work.
687 people hold the Sanitation Laborer role across 1 department in City of Chicago, with a median total compensation of $99,403.
- Employees
- 687
- Median pay
- $99,403
- Departments
- 1
- Cross-jurisdiction
- #1 of 1
Compared with the local labor market
Sanitation Laborer pay vs. the Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN area
Across all employers in the Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN area, the median wage for Refuse and Recyclable Material Collectors — about 3,330 people — is $77,470. City of Chicago pays a median base salary of $99,403 for this role, 28% above that figure — above the 90th percentile of local pay for the occupation.
Where City of Chicago sits in the local pay range
The bar is the range of annual wages for Refuse and Recyclable Material Collectors across every employer in the Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN area, from the 10th to the 90th percentile, with the middle 50% highlighted. The marker shows City of Chicago’s median base salary for this role. Both figures are base pay only.
And across the country
Nationwide, the median wage for Refuse and Recyclable Material Collectors — about 147,240 people — is $49,690. City of Chicago’s median base salary is 100% above that national figure, above the 90th percentile of pay for the occupation nationally.
Local and national wages differ for reasons beyond how well a job pays — cost of living, the mix of employers, and local demand for the occupation all move the Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN range relative to the national one.
Computed over the 685 of 687 people in this role paid at least $25,000 in base salary. The rest are part-year or part-time records, whose actual pay isn’t comparable to a full-time annual wage.
Median total compensation for this role at City of Chicago is $99,403, which includes overtime and employer-paid benefits. The benchmark above excludes both, so total compensation is deliberately not compared against it.
Benchmark: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (May 2025). BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) covers all employers in the area — private, non-profit, and government alike — so this is a comparison against the whole local labor market for the occupation, not against private-sector pay. OEWS wages are straight-time pay and exclude overtime, shift differentials, and employer-paid benefits, so the government figure shown here is base pay on the same basis. Total compensation is not comparable to it. Job titles are matched to the closest standard occupation, so the comparison is between similar work rather than an identical job classification.