Does The ACS Comparator Provide Comparisons For U.S. Areas Outside The “Lower 48” States And The District Of Columbia?
No. ACS’s current comparator system uses only data for the 48 mainland states and Washington, D.C. The Society’s databases do not include sufficient data to create reliable adjustments for chemists located in Alaska, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, or at overseas military locations reached via postal APO addresses, although at least one person (and usually more) from every one of those locations can be found in the full ACS ChemCensus datasets. Since adjustments for these locations can’t be provided, and since pay scales in these areas are likely to include special allowances for unique locations, we’ve opted to leave them out of the comparative system altogether. Users in such locations may still benefit from knowledge of mainland U.S. compensation scales, and can also make use of such services as the Homefair relocation salary calculator to explore appropriate adjustments in scales (see additional comments under the heading “Can I Explore the Implications of a Mov
