What is the Average Salary of a Dental Assistant in South Florida?
Some dental assistants in the South Florida area, which includes Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Miami Beach, made average wages that were greater than the national average of $34,000 in May 2009, while others' average wages were a few thousand dollars per year less.
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Salaries
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Dental assistants earned average wages of $16.48 per hour or $34,270 per year in the Miami-Fort Lauderdale-Miami Beach metropolitan area in May 2009, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, or BLS. In the Miami-Miami Beach-Kendall metropolitan area, average dental assistant wages were $15.27 hourly or $31,770 annually. Salaries ranged from $24,180 or less for the lowest-paid 10 percent of dental assistants in Miami-Miami Beach-Kendall to $33,960 and up for the highest-paid 10th of dental assistants in Miami-Fort Lauderdale-Miami Beach.
Comparison
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South Florida dental assistants' salaries are, on average, more than $10,000 per year less than those in the five highest-paying metropolitan areas, according to figures from the BLS. Santa Rosa-Petaluma, California, was the highest-paying metropolitan area in the United States in May 2009, with an average salary of $46,740 per year. There were eight higher-paying metropolitan areas than South Florida in the state in May 2009, BLS figures show, including Bradenton-Sarasota-Venice, Cape Coral-Fort Myers, Gainesville, Naples-Marcos Island, Port St. Lucie, Punta Gorda, Sebastian-Vero Beach and Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater.
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State Ranking
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Florida ranked 24th in the nation in terms of average salaries for dental assistants in May 2009, the BLS reports, one place behind New York and one spot ahead of Illinois.
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References
- Photo Credit Dentist at work in dental room image by Vladimir Melnik from Fotolia.com
