How much do millwrights make in Missouri in 2026?

The median millwright salary in Missouri is $66,480 a year, or about $31.96 an hour based on a standard 2,080-hour work year. That's the middle of the road — half of Missouri millwrights earn more, half earn less. If you're just starting out or working in a lower-paying region of the state, expect to land closer to the 25th percentile at $53,010 annually ($25.49/hr). If you've got years of experience, specialized rigging skills, or you're pulling shifts in a high-demand industrial facility, the 75th percentile sits at $91,780 a year — roughly $44.13 an hour. That's a spread of nearly $38,800 between the bottom quarter and the top quarter, which tells you this trade rewards experience and specialization in a real, measurable way.

Missouri's industrial base is the main driver of millwright demand in the state. Food and beverage processing plants, automotive assembly facilities, power generation stations, paper mills, and chemical plants all rely on millwrights to install, maintain, align, and overhaul heavy machinery. The St. Louis metro area and Kansas City corridor tend to concentrate the larger manufacturing and processing operations, which generally means more work and more competitive pay than you'd find in rural parts of the state. Springfield and Joplin also have manufacturing presence, though the scale is smaller.

What separates a $53,000 millwright from a $91,000 one is usually a combination of factors. Precision alignment work — laser alignment, vibration analysis, and shaft alignment on turbines or large pumps — commands a premium because not every millwright can do it accurately. Experience with specific OEM equipment matters too; a facility running a particular brand of paper machine or industrial press wants someone who already knows the equipment. Rigging and crane signaling certifications add value on job sites where heavy lifts are routine. Shutdown and turnaround work, which typically runs around the clock on tight schedules, often pays higher hourly rates or significant overtime on top of base pay. A millwright clearing $91,000 in Missouri has almost certainly stacked multiple skills and is working in environments that demand them.

Apprenticeship is the standard path into the trade. A four- or five-year program combines on-the-job hours with related technical instruction covering hydraulics, pneumatics, welding, blueprint reading, and precision measurement. Completing an apprenticeship puts you in a stronger position than an informal hire, both in terms of skill depth and the wage steps that come with progression through the program. No union scale data is available for Missouri millwrights in the current BLS dataset, so the figures here reflect the broader employed workforce across union and non-union shops alike.

Overtime is a significant factor in real take-home pay for this trade. Millwrights are often called in for emergency breakdowns or scheduled maintenance outages that run nights, weekends, and holidays. A worker earning the median $31.96/hr base rate who logs 200 hours of overtime in a year at time-and-a-half adds roughly $9,590 to their annual pay — pushing total compensation well above the reported median. That kind of availability and flexibility is one reason experienced millwrights can consistently outpace the published salary figures.

All figures on this page come from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) survey, May 2025. BLS collects data directly from employers, making it one of the most reliable benchmarks available for trade wages. TradesPays reports these numbers without adjustment so you can compare apples to apples across states and trades.