What an HR specialist or recruiter costs in the US
The wage BLS measured across 912,430 jobs, what an employer pays on top of it, the pay in every state, and which of the job's core tasks already show up in AI use.
Medians for the whole US. Your own cost depends on where you hire, the benefits you offer and the hours worked.
- Median wage
- $75,940
- Hourly wage
- $36.51
- Loaded per hour
- $45.47
- Middle half earns
- $58,610 to $99,380
- Jobs in the US
- 912,430
Wage × 1.2455 for benefits and payroll taxes, from BLS.
An HR specialist or recruiter in the US is paid a median $75,940 a year, $36.51 an hour, across 912,430 jobs. With benefits, a small employer pays about $94,580. Of its 10 core tasks, 2 showed up in Claude.ai conversations in May 2026, and in 1 of those Claude mostly did the task rather than assisting.
The work, task by task
The 10 core tasks O*NET lists for human resources specialists, most important first, and how each showed up in Claude.ai conversations in May 2026. The bar splits those conversations between Claude doing the task and Claude helping a person do it.
- 01Interpret and explain human resources policies, procedures, laws, standards, or regulations.Claude.ai: 24% did the task, 76% helped · API: 64% did the task
- 02Hire employees and process hiring-related paperwork.
- 03Maintain current knowledge of Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) and affirmative action guidelines and laws, such as the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).
- 04Prepare or maintain employment records related to events, such as hiring, termination, leaves, transfers, or promotions, using human resources management system software.Claude.ai: 67% did the task, 33% helped · API: 97% did the task
- 05Address employee relations issues, such as harassment allegations, work complaints, or other employee concerns.
- 06Review employment applications and job orders to match applicants with job requirements.API: 98% did the task, 2% helped
- 07Inform job applicants of details such as duties and responsibilities, compensation, benefits, schedules, working conditions, or promotion opportunities.
- 08Select qualified job applicants or refer them to managers, making hiring recommendations when appropriate.
- 09Schedule or conduct new employee orientations.
- 10Maintain and update human resources documents, such as organizational charts, employee handbooks or directories, or performance evaluation forms.
2 of 10 tasks appear in the Claude.ai sample of the Anthropic Economic Index for May 2026, and 1 more only in its sample of API traffic, where businesses run Claude inside their own software. A task without a row had too few conversations for Anthropic to publish, which is not the same as none. Shares are of all sampled Claude.ai conversations, so small figures are normal: 0.03% of every conversation that month was about this occupation.
Pay by state
The median annual wage in each state and DC, and the same wage fully loaded. District of Columbia pays the most, $110,970; Arkansas the least, $55,010.
| State | Median wage | Fully loaded | Middle half | Jobs |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alabama | $64,940 | $80,880 | $50,930 to $85,030 | 11,080 |
| Alaska | $76,990 | $95,890 | $61,840 to $92,320 | 1,420 |
| Arizona | $71,390 | $88,920 | $56,590 to $93,040 | 20,230 |
| Arkansas | $55,010 | $68,510 | $43,730 to $74,600 | 6,230 |
| California | $83,500 | $104,000 | $66,060 to $117,430 | 104,000 |
| Colorado | $80,840 | $100,690 | $62,400 to $104,750 | 19,450 |
| Connecticut | $82,890 | $103,240 | $63,480 to $107,280 | 9,010 |
| Delaware | $77,700 | $96,780 | $61,700 to $100,840 | 2,720 |
| District of Columbia | $110,970 | $138,210 | $82,270 to $148,700 | 6,910 |
| Florida | $66,410 | $82,710 | $51,200 to $90,350 | 62,730 |
| Georgia | $70,570 | $87,890 | $53,680 to $95,610 | 32,110 |
| Hawaii | $73,750 | $91,860 | $59,540 to $92,010 | 2,570 |
| Idaho | $64,990 | $80,950 | $49,460 to $81,050 | 3,930 |
| Illinois | $76,820 | $95,680 | $60,750 to $98,580 | 35,430 |
| Indiana | $65,600 | $81,700 | $52,450 to $84,740 | 17,110 |
| Iowa | $66,710 | $83,090 | $53,890 to $85,770 | 7,930 |
| Kansas | $70,870 | $88,270 | $55,190 to $93,380 | 7,560 |
| Kentucky | $69,010 | $85,950 | $52,680 to $84,990 | 10,900 |
| Louisiana | $61,300 | $76,350 | $48,900 to $78,710 | 7,240 |
| Maine | $71,630 | $89,220 | $57,690 to $89,860 | 3,020 |
| Maryland | $83,910 | $104,510 | $64,760 to $111,530 | 15,530 |
| Massachusetts | $85,630 | $106,650 | $67,050 to $115,060 | 27,300 |
| Michigan | $69,520 | $86,590 | $55,560 to $89,270 | 25,520 |
| Minnesota | $78,760 | $98,100 | $61,860 to $100,930 | 17,240 |
| Mississippi | $60,300 | $75,100 | $48,290 to $83,280 | 4,850 |
| Missouri | $66,990 | $83,440 | $51,710 to $89,860 | 17,650 |
| Montana | $63,790 | $79,450 | $53,390 to $81,280 | 2,340 |
| Nebraska | $61,930 | $77,130 | $48,890 to $79,470 | 7,220 |
| Nevada | $71,610 | $89,190 | $57,680 to $94,990 | 6,520 |
| New Hampshire | $70,840 | $88,230 | $57,090 to $93,650 | 4,270 |
| New Jersey | $80,690 | $100,500 | $65,890 to $103,160 | 21,690 |
| New Mexico | $68,050 | $84,760 | $56,220 to $89,560 | 4,090 |
| New York | $84,380 | $105,100 | $65,260 to $118,380 | 54,610 |
| North Carolina | $73,070 | $91,010 | $56,850 to $96,910 | 31,140 |
| North Dakota | $75,630 | $94,200 | $60,570 to $90,000 | 1,710 |
| Ohio | $70,180 | $87,410 | $54,570 to $92,460 | 33,500 |
| Oklahoma | $61,630 | $76,760 | $48,560 to $81,280 | 9,370 |
| Oregon | $78,060 | $97,220 | $62,820 to $99,860 | 10,620 |
| Pennsylvania | $70,450 | $87,750 | $56,050 to $90,920 | 36,960 |
| Rhode Island | $77,560 | $96,600 | $62,180 to $97,210 | 3,320 |
| South Carolina | $65,370 | $81,420 | $51,810 to $87,420 | 13,720 |
| South Dakota | $67,590 | $84,180 | $54,910 to $88,100 | 1,340 |
| Tennessee | $67,370 | $83,910 | $53,890 to $85,200 | 21,460 |
| Texas | $68,920 | $85,840 | $52,900 to $90,790 | 84,930 |
| Utah | $71,750 | $89,360 | $56,450 to $95,090 | 9,900 |
| Vermont | $77,800 | $96,900 | $63,900 to $93,300 | 1,270 |
| Virginia | $82,090 | $102,240 | $62,070 to $108,970 | 28,540 |
| Washington | $84,550 | $105,310 | $69,200 to $110,550 | 22,770 |
| West Virginia | $66,860 | $83,270 | $52,660 to $91,560 | 3,130 |
| Wisconsin | $70,540 | $87,860 | $57,880 to $85,440 | 17,360 |
| Wyoming | $66,970 | $83,410 | $53,750 to $94,060 | 1,000 |
The same benefits ratio applies in every state, because BLS does not publish benefit costs by business size for each state. The middle half is the 25th to 75th percentile wage.
Where the numbers come from
Every figure is copied from a public file. The only arithmetic is the loaded cost: the wage times 1.2455.
- Wages
- BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025, occupation 13-1071 (Human Resources Specialists). Annual figures are the hourly wage times 2,080 hours, as BLS computes them, so they already include pay for paid leave.
- Fully loaded
- BLS Employer Costs for Employee Compensation, June 2026 (2026 Q2), private businesses with 1 to 49 workers: $37.64 an hour in total compensation over $27.88 in wages plus $2.34 in paid leave gives 1.2455. Paid leave sits in the denominator because the annual wage already pays it.
- Tasks
- O*NET 31.0 core tasks for 13-1071.00, the ten most important by their importance rating. A few occupations list fewer core tasks.
- AI use
- Anthropic Economic Index, release of June 2026, conversations from May 2026. "Did the task" is Anthropic's automation share, where the user directs Claude to do the work; "helped" is augmentation, where the user works with Claude to learn, check or iterate.
- Not measured
- What a particular business pays, and whether an AI system can do a task well. The AI figures count conversations about a task, not jobs replaced.
This page includes information from the O*NET 31.0 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license. O*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. AI use data from the Anthropic Economic Index by Anthropic, under CC BY. Wage and benefit data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
What would an AI system cost for this work?
Put $94,580 beside the running cost of a system doing the tasks above, with the build counted in year one.
BLS wages May 2025 · O*NET 31.0 · Anthropic Economic Index