The State of Firefighting: 2026 Annual Report (Salary, Incidents & Hiring Data)

Every year, the U.S. fire service responds to millions of emergencies, employs hundreds of thousands of career and volunteer firefighters, and covers communities that range from dense urban cores to remote rural counties. This report consolidates the most current available data on firefighter salaries, fire incident trends, department structure, and hiring into a single reference for candidates, departments, researchers, and journalists.

Data sources: Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OES) 2024 release; NFPA Fire Department Survey 2023; U.S. Fire Administration National Fire Incident Reporting System (NFIRS) 2022. All salary figures are for career (paid) firefighters unless otherwise noted.

Executive Summary

• Median national salary: $54,650 per year for career firefighters (BLS OES 2024)
• Total career firefighters: Approximately 360,000 employed nationally
• Total fire departments: 29,705 departments in the U.S. (NFPA 2023), of which 2,786 are all-career and 19,424 are all-volunteer
• Annual emergency responses: 36.0 million responses per year (NFPA 2023), a 7% increase over five years
• Residential fires: 490,500 residential structure fires in 2022 (USFA)
• Line-of-duty deaths: 97 firefighter fatalities in 2022 (NFPA)

Firefighter Salary Data by State (2024)

The following table presents BLS OES 2024 median annual wages for firefighters (SOC code 33-2011) by state. Wages reflect base pay and do not include overtime, hazard pay, or pension contributions.

Note: States not listed either have suppressed data (insufficient sample size for reliable estimate) or very low career firefighter employment relative to volunteer departments. For the full 50-state salary breakdown, see our individual state salary guides.

What Drives Salary Variation Between States?

The wage gap between the highest-paid states (California, New Jersey, Washington) and the lowest is not simply a cost-of-living adjustment. Several factors drive these differences:

• Union density: States with strong IAFF (International Association of Fire Fighters) local representation tend to have higher base wages. California, New Jersey, and Illinois have high union membership rates among career firefighters.
• Urbanization: Large municipal departments in high-cost metro areas pay significantly more than smaller suburban or rural departments. A firefighter in Los Angeles County earns far more than a firefighter in a small California city, even within the same state.
• Department size and funding: Property tax revenue, special districts, and local government budgets determine how much departments can pay. High-property-value areas have more tax revenue per capita for fire services.
• Career vs. combination departments: States with a higher proportion of combination (paid + volunteer) departments show lower median salaries because part-time paid firefighters suppress the state median.

Fire Incident Data and Trends

Total emergency responses by U.S. fire departments have grown steadily over the past decade, driven primarily by increases in EMS (emergency medical service) calls rather than fire calls. The following table shows response type breakdown (NFPA 2023):

The dominance of EMS calls reflects a fundamental shift in the fire service over the past 30 years. Most career firefighters today function as dual-role first responders — trained as EMTs or paramedics in addition to their firefighting skills. Departments that don’t offer EMS services are increasingly rare among career departments.

Structure Fire Decline: Long-Term Trends

Structure fires now account for just 3.6% of all U.S. fire department emergency responses — 1.3 million structure fire calls out of 36.0 million total annual responses (NFPA 2023). Medical and EMS calls, by contrast, represent 68.9% of all responses. This shift reflects a fundamental change in what firefighters do: today’s career firefighter is primarily a medical first responder who also suppresses fires, not the reverse.

The long-term trend in structure fires is positive: residential fire deaths have declined significantly over the past 40 years, attributable to the widespread adoption of smoke detectors, improved building codes, and fire sprinkler requirements in new construction. However, modern construction trends — lightweight construction, synthetic materials, open floor plans — have shortened the time to structural collapse in residential fires from roughly 17 minutes (traditional balloon-frame construction) to as few as 3–5 minutes. This is a significant operational challenge for firefighting tactics.

Department Structure and Staffing

The U.S. fire service is overwhelmingly composed of volunteer departments by number, but career departments protect the majority of the population (NFPA 2023):

Volunteer firefighter numbers have declined steadily since peaking in the 1980s, when approximately 1.1 million volunteers served. Declining volunteerism — driven by changing work schedules, longer commutes, and the increased time commitment required by modern training requirements — is a significant challenge for communities that depend on volunteer departments.

Hiring Trends and the Job Market for Firefighters

The fire service job market in 2026 is characterized by high competition in large urban departments and genuine shortages in rural and suburban combination departments. Key trends:

• Retirement wave: Departments that hired heavily in the 1990s and early 2000s are now managing large cohorts of retirement-eligible firefighters. This is creating openings, particularly in the 2024–2028 window.
• Physical fitness requirements: The CPAT (Candidate Physical Ability Test) is now standard in most large departments. Candidates who prepare specifically for the CPAT’s eight events have significantly higher pass rates than those who rely on general fitness.
• Written testing: Most departments use standardized written tests (often from National Testing Network or similar providers) covering reading comprehension, mechanical aptitude, and math. Scores are used to rank candidates for oral board interviews.
• Paramedic preference: An increasing number of departments require EMT certification as a minimum hire requirement, with paramedic certification preferred or required for higher-paying positions. Earning a paramedic license before applying significantly improves a candidate’s competitiveness.
• Diversity initiatives: Many large departments are actively recruiting women and minority candidates through targeted outreach, modified testing schedules, and mentorship programs. This has not lowered standards but has broadened the applicant pool.

Line-of-Duty Deaths and Firefighter Health

The long-term trend in firefighter line-of-duty deaths is downward — from over 100 annually in most years prior to 2012 to the low 90s in recent years — but cancer has emerged as the leading cause of firefighter death. NFPA data indicates that cardiac events account for the largest single share of on-duty fatalities (roughly 45%), but cancer, recognized as an occupational disease caused by carcinogen exposure during fire suppression, is now responsible for more cumulative firefighter deaths than any single cause.

The adoption of improved PPE, post-fire decontamination protocols, and cancer screening programs represents the most significant current effort in firefighter occupational health. Many states now provide cancer presumption laws, which establish that certain cancers in firefighters are presumed to be work-related for workers’ compensation purposes without requiring the firefighter to prove occupational causation.

Staffing Shortage Crisis

The U.S. fire service faces a growing staffing crisis on two fronts:

• Federal wildland firefighters: The U.S. Forest Service had more than 5,000 vacant firefighting positions as of mid-2025 — a 26% vacancy rate. California’s Forest Service has reported 26% vacancies for engine captains and 42% for engineers.
• Volunteer decline: Nationally, volunteer firefighter numbers have fallen to approximately 676,900 (2020 NFPA data), continuing a multi-decade decline from the ~1.1 million peak of the 1980s. New York State alone dropped from 120,000 to under 80,000 volunteers over two decades.
• Operational impact: A four-person crew can conduct an aggressive interior attack on a structure fire. A three-person crew typically must operate defensively. Staffing shortages are directly changing how departments can respond.

Methodology and Data Notes

Salary data sourced from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OES) program, May 2024 release, Standard Occupational Classification code 33-2011 (Firefighters). Employment estimates are rounded. Some states have suppressed employment data where sample sizes were insufficient for reliable state-level estimates.

Fire department and incident data sourced from NFPA’s annual U.S. Fire Department Profile survey (2023 data) and the U.S. Fire Administration’s National Fire Incident Reporting System. Figures represent the most recently available full-year data at time of publication (March 2026).

This report will be updated annually. If you use this data in a publication, please cite: FirefighterNow, “The State of Firefighting: 2026 Annual Report,” firefighternow.com/state-of-firefighting-2026.

Want to explore firefighter salary data for a specific state? Use our Firefighter Salary Calculator, or browse our full library of state-by-state salary guides.