Salary

• According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, or BLS, as of May 2009, the average salary in the United States for a psychiatric social worker was $41,350, or $19.88 an hour. The median salary was $38,200, with those workers in the bottom 10 percent earning $24,940 and those in the top 10 percent earning $62,760.
  
  

Industry

• According to the BLS, most psychiatric social workers were employed in either outpatient care centers or the industry of individual and family services, the former of which paid $40,220 a year and the latter of which paid $38,680 a year. Psychiatric social workers could also be found in residential mental retardation, mental health and substance abuse facilities earning an average of $35,560 or psychiatric and substance abuse hospitals earning $47,010. Those workers employed by a local government earned an average of $46,240 annually as of May 2009.
  
  

Location

• Wages for psychiatric social workers varied from state to state. In 2009, New Jersey offered the highest salary average for psychiatric social workers at $59,000, followed by Rhode Island at $52,100. Maryland, Hawaii and Connecticut also made the top five with salary averages ranging from $50,560 to $50,750. Psychiatric social workers in the metropolitan area of Vallejo-Fairfield, California, earned the highest average salary in their field at $68,760, followed by those in Anderson, Indiana, at $67,850.
  
  

Outlook

• The employment of social workers was projected to grow 16 percent between 2008 and 2018 by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and 20 percent for psychiatric social workers specifically. The BLS also pointed out that opportunities for psychiatric social workers to move into private practice will expand because their rates are generally less expensive than those of psychologists.