PERM Tracker
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Updated

PERM jobs in Portland, OR

Decisions
1,658
Approved
96.2%
Median certified wage
$90,000
Years
FY2016 to FY2026

Year by year

  • certified
  • denied
  • withdrawn
Fiscal years run October to September. More

Fiscal years run October to September. FY2016 to FY2023 come from DOL's closed-year files, and FY2024 on from its current ones. The newest year is partial until DOL publishes its fourth quarter.

Every year as a table
Fiscal year Certified Denied Withdrawn
FY2016 115 7 4
FY2017 90 5 6
FY2018 167 9 2
FY2019 116 2 10
FY2020 92 3 12
FY2021 215 15 8
FY2022 168 3 3
FY2023 110 4 18
FY2024 140 5 6
FY2025 152 0 13
FY2026 146 6 6

Top sponsors

Top occupations

Industries

Countries of citizenship

Worker's education

  • Master's 487
  • Bachelor's 353
  • None 288
  • Doctorate 88
  • Other 44
  • High School 20
  • Associate's 15

Visa held when filed

  • H-1B 756
  • F-1 115
  • L-1 84
  • E-2 75
  • NOT IN USA 58
  • TN 26
  • F-2 13
  • B-2 8
  • H-4 8
  • E-1 6

H-1B in Portland, OR

7,502 labor condition applications name a worksite here, FY2020 to FY2026, and DOL certified 7,040 (94%). An LCA is the employer's wage attestation before an H-1B petition, so it counts positions offered. It doesn't count people hired.

Jobs, certified LCAs since FY2024

  1. Software Developers 617
  2. Computer Systems Engineers/Architects 247
  3. Computer Systems Analysts 127
  4. Software Quality Assurance Analysts and Testers 91
  5. Data Scientists 87
  6. Computer Programmers 75
  7. Civil Engineers 68
  8. Computer and Information Systems Managers 66
  9. Hospitalists 64
  10. Biochemists and Biophysicists 47

Where Portland, OR sits

Counties
Clackamas, Multnomah and Washington counties
Census places Portland city in all three
Metro area
Portland-Vancouver-Hillsboro, OR-WA
Metropolitan statistical area
DOL wage area
Portland-Vancouver-Hillsboro, OR-WA
The area DOL sets prevailing wages for, wage year 2026-27

105.4 is BEA's price level for the Portland-Vancouver-Hillsboro, OR-WA metro area in 2024, against 100 for the country as a whole; for housing rents it's 125.1. A salary here buys about 95% of what the same salary buys at the national price level.

What these jobs pay in Portland-Vancouver-Hillsboro, OR-WA BLS May 2025, DOL wage year 2026-27
  • Cooks, Restaurant
    163 PERM decisions
  • Packers and Packagers, Hand
    68 PERM decisions
  • Software Developers
    67 PERM decisions
  • Civil Engineers
    53 PERM decisions
  • Electronics Engineers, Except Computer
    38 PERM decisions

Each row has its own scale, marked at its ends: these jobs pay too differently to share one. The table compares them.

  • middle half of pay (BLS)
  • median
  • 10th to 90th percentile
  • DOL's Levels I to IV, left to right
Market pay and DOL wage levels for the jobs filed most here
Job BLS median Level I Level II Level III Level IV
Cooks, Restaurant $45,200 $37,523 $41,850 $46,197 $50,523
Packers and Packagers, Hand $37,450 $34,050 $36,712 $39,354 $42,016
Software Developers $156,000 $103,605 $128,773 $153,962 $179,130
Civil Engineers $106,280 $80,600 $99,445 $118,269 $137,114
Electronics Engineers, Except Computer $129,330 $94,973 $119,912 $144,851 $169,790

Any job in any area, and every wage year since 2021-22, in the wage-level tool.

The jobs filed most in Portland, OR: what employers in the metro report paying everyone in each, and DOL's four prevailing wage levels there. BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics; DOL OFLC wage tables

The worksite city on each application, from DOL's decided cases since FY2016. Spellings of one city are pooled, and a city counts as one place per state.

Case data through Jun 30, 2026 · LCA disclosures through Jun 30, 2026 · Census places and metros through Jan 1, 2026 · BLS market pay through May 31, 2025 · DOL wage tables through Jul 1, 2026. How these figures are counted. Spotted an error? Tell us; every fix is dated in the corrections log.

The sources in full

Case data: DOL quarterly disclosure files (flag.dol.gov) · data through Jun 30, 2026 · quarterly

LCA disclosures: DOL quarterly LCA disclosure files (www.dol.gov) · data through Jun 30, 2026 · quarterly

Census places and metros: Census Bureau Gazetteer and metro delineation files (census.gov) · data through Jan 1, 2026 · yearly

BLS market pay: BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (bls.gov) · data through May 31, 2025 · yearly, each spring

DOL wage tables: DOL OFLC wage data downloads (flag.dol.gov) · data through Jul 1, 2026 · yearly, each july

What each source includes

Case data: Decided PERM cases only. A case still waiting isn't in here, so counts and durations describe finished cases.

LCA disclosures: Certified and denied H-1B labor condition applications only, with the wage offered.

Census places and metros: Where each worksite city sits: its county, metro area and DOL wage area, matched to Census's place and county files. A city Census lists in no single place is left unmatched. This site doesn't guess it.

BLS market pay: Pay employers report for everyone in each job, from BLS's yearly survey (May of the year named). It's shown nationally, by state and by metro. It covers citizens and immigrants alike, and it isn't drawn from PERM offers.

DOL wage tables: The four prevailing wage levels DOL publishes for every job in every area, each wage year from 2021-22, as DOL's own tables print them. They're the floors an offer is held to. They don't show what anyone was paid.

Cite this page

Waiting on a PERM case?

  • When it'll likely be decided
  • An email when DOL moves it

It's on your ETA-9089 receipt. A case number looks like G-100-26125-868956.

Don't have the number?