Associate Specialist H-1B wages

Filings decided July 2025 to June 2026. Most are classified as Biochemists and Biophysicists (SOC 19-1021).

Employers filed 80 wage applications for Associate Specialist jobs from July 2025 to June 2026, across 10 employers. The median offered wage was $82,100, exactly the government's prevailing wage, the legal minimum, for the job. University of California, San Francisco filed the most (50, median $83,600).

Filings: 80
Positions covered: 79
Employers: 10
Median offered: $82,100
Median prevailing wage: $80,700
Filings since FY2020: 399
Median offer change since FY2020: +29%

Associate Specialist, all employers80 filings, July 2025 to June 2026

$82,100Median wage employers told the government they would pay

$79,100 to $85,250Where the middle half of the filings fall

$80,700Prevailing wage: the legal minimum for these jobs

Offered wage since 2020

The median wage offered for Associate Specialist jobs rose 29%, from $64,700 in fiscal 2020 to $83,600 in fiscal 2026 so far. In fiscal 2026 it sat exactly on the prevailing wage. Filings peaked in fiscal 2020, with 69 filings.

Middle half of offered wagesMedian offered wageMedian prevailing wageFilings per year

Fiscal years run October to September. Fiscal 2026 is still running: these figures cover October 2025 to June 2026.

Associate Specialist by fiscal year

Fiscal year	Filings	Median offered	vs year before	Median prevailing	vs prevailing
2026 (Oct to Jun)	57	$83,600	+3.6%	$82,150	at the minimum
2025	63	$80,700	+5.5%	$79,200	at the minimum
2024	51	$76,500	+8.2%	$76,200	at the minimum
2023	48	$70,700	−0.5%	$70,700	at the minimum
2022	63	$71,050	+4.6%	$70,700	at the minimum
2021	48	$67,900	+4.9%	$66,000	at the minimum
2020	69	$64,700	n/a	$63,400	at the minimum

Employers that file for this title

Middle half of offered wagesMedian offered wageMedian prevailing wage

Employer	Filings	Median offered	vs prevailing
University of California, San Francisco	50	$83,600	at the minimum
University of California, Irvine	9	$79,200	at the minimum
University of California, Davis	5	$82,100	+7.7%
University of California at Santa Barbara	4	$82,285	at the minimum
Regents of the University of California at Riverside	4	$79,100	at the minimum
University of California, Agriculture and Natural Resources	2	$79,200	+4.8%
University of California, Berkeley	2	$95,040	+20.0%
Applied Medical Resources Corporation	2	$85,000	+20.8%
University of California, Merced	1	$83,600	at the minimum
University of California, Santa Cruz	1	$99,700	at the minimum

Where Associate Specialist jobs are filed

Worksite	Filings	Median offered	vs prevailing
San Francisco, CA	49	$83,600	at the minimum
Irvine, CA	9	$79,200	at the minimum
Riverside, CA	4	$79,100	at the minimum
Santa Barbara, CA	4	$82,285	at the minimum
Davis, CA	3	$81,400	+7.7%
Berkeley, CA	2	$95,040	+20.0%
Modesto, CA	2	$79,200	+4.8%
Rancho Santa Margarita, CA	2	$85,000	+20.8%
Atlanta, GA	1	$82,100	at the minimum
Merced, CA	1	$83,600	at the minimum
Oakland, CA	1	$74,500	at the minimum
Onset, MA	1	$99,700	at the minimum
Salinas, CA	1	$85,500	+16.6%

Seniority of the jobs filed

Level I, entry100%

Level II, qualified0%

Level III, experienced0%

Level IV, fully competent0%

The government assigns each job one of four wage levels. A higher level means a higher legal minimum.

What these numbers are

They are wages employers attested to on Labor Condition Applications (Form ETA-9035), not paychecks. Bonuses and stock are not included.
A filing is not a visa or a hire. One filing can cover several positions, and some are later withdrawn. Wage figures use certified filings only.
The prevailing wage is the minimum the employer must pay for that job in that area, set from government wage surveys.
2 filings are for part-time work. Hourly wages are shown as full-time equivalents (2,080 hours a year).

Source: U.S. Department of Labor, OFLC disclosure data. How we clean and count it.