Second Southeast Indiana Regional Wage & Benefit Report Published

Wages paid by employers increased over the past year.

(Dearborn County, Ind.) - Wages paid by area employers increased by 3.3 percent over the past year, according to the 2025 Southeast Indiana Regional Wage & Benefits Survey.

One Dearborn recently partnered with Purdue University’s Dauch Center for the Management of Manufacturing Enterprises and REDI Cincinnati to conduct the survey of regional employers in March 2025. Also assisting with survey distribution were Ripley County Economic Development Corporation, Batesville Economic Development Commission, Franklin County Economic Development Commission, Dearborn County Chamber of Commerce, and Franklin County Chamber of Commerce.

This report follows the inaugural regional wage and benefits survey report published in February 2024, when 26 companies participated. In this latest survey, 39 companies across Dearborn, Franklin, Ohio, and Ripley counties in Southeast Indiana, Hamilton County, Ohio, and Boone County, Kentucky, responded to the survey.

Here are more key figures from the 2025 survey:

• Eighty-one percent of companies reported either stable or growing employment levels over the past two years, indicating a resilient regional labor market.
• About 54 percent of employers expected to add jobs within the next 12 months.
• Recruitment challenges are easing, down seven percent from the 2024 report. Top barriers to finding qualified employees continue to be “lack of experience” and “specialized skills.”
• Child care benefits were included in the survey for the first time, providing a new baseline for understanding how employers support working families. Only 23 percent of Southeast Indiana employers offer any child care benefit.

“Recently we’ve been hearing more about the importance of child care benefits as a way of improving workforce participation and employee reliability,” said One Dearborn Executive Director Mike Perleberg. “So for this second iteration of the survey, we included a short section on child care concerns and benefits. This along with the wider range of wages and benefit information will give our employers a way to compare their offerings and understand how they can best compete for local talent.”

The 2025 survey underscores One Dearborn’s ongoing efforts to support existing businesses in retaining employees and promote ongoing investment in the region. The information contained in the report will help employers benchmark compensation and improve competitiveness in today’s evolving labor landscape.

For more information on One Dearborn or to read the Wage & Benefit Report’s Executive Summary visit https://1dearborn.org/second-southeast-indiana-regional-wage-benefits-report-published/.