New York is best known, of course, for New York City. The Big Apple. The financial center of the U.S. More than 60 million tourists visit New York City each year, but New York also offers upstate adventures in the Thousand Islands and Niagara Falls. It’s also home to the Finger Lakes AVA (American Viticultural Area), which produces amazing white wines.
If you’re lucky enough to be a New Yorker, the state has plenty to offer for those looking to start a career in finance and financial planning. The median household income in 2019 for New York state was $68,486 per year. This figure is more than $5K higher than the national median household income of $62,843, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. New Yorkers do pay higher rents than the national average, though, with median gross rent of $1,280 per month compared with $1,062.
Unfortunately, unemployment in New York is quite high post-pandemic at 8.2% unemployment, 1.5 percentage points higher than the national unemployment rate of 6.7% and 4.3 percentage points higher than the December 2019 unemployment rate of 3.9%, according to the U.S. Department of Bureau & Labor Statistics (BLS).
New York ranks No. 4 in the U.S. for the number of Certified Financial Planners located in that state –4,892, which represents 5.5% of the total number of CFPs across the U.S., according to the CFP Board. CFPs are fiduciaries, which means they’re required to act in the best interest of their clients when it comes to financial products. If you plan to work in finance or financial planning in New York, you will need to decide whether to work as a fee-based advisor who earns fees from clients through asset management, or a commission-based advisor, earning fees on product/service sales and purchases.
The BLS provides data for financial advisors, stockbrokers and life insurance agent/annuity producers in the New York regions of Albany-Schenectady-Troy, Binghamton, Buffalo-Cheektowaga-Niagara Falls, Central East New York nonmetropolitan area, Ithaca, Kingston, New York-Newark-Jersey City, Rochester, Southwest New York nonmetropolitan area, Syracuse and Utica-Rome.
Financial Advisor Salary in New York
There are a whopping 26,900 financial advisors in the New York City-Newark-Jersey City region, and these advisors earn the highest mean salary in the state of $165,830. The salaries are high across the board with the lowest, $70,930, earned by advisors in Ithaca.
Stockbroker Salary in New York
Annual mean stockbroker salaries in the New York City-Newark-Jersey City region again top the list at $149,880, which is no surprise. The next highest-paying region is Utica-Rome at $132,710 per year, and then the salaries dip to the $80K range and lower to the lowest state salary of $65,960 in the Central East New York nonmetropolitan area. Salaries for experienced brokers in the 75th percentile don’t necessarily reflect much of a jump from the annual mean wages we see across the state.
Life/Annuity Producer Salary in New York
The salaries for New York life insurance agents start at $49,580 in the Southwest New York nonmetropolitan area and go up to an annual mean salary of $91,540 in the Albany-Schenectady-Troy region. The salaries for experienced agents in the 90th percentile, however, go all the way up to $181,080 in Binghamton.
(Salary and job growth data reported by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics in May 2019 for personal financial advisors; securities, commodities and financial services sales agents; and insurance sales agents. Figures represent national data, not school-specific information. Conditions in your area may vary. Information accessed February 2021.)