Organizations interested in creating peer programs want to know how to classify peer workers by job title and how much to pay them. We used two strategies to estimate 2024 peer worker salaries in Iowa: a job ads study and a statewide survey. 

Iowa Peer Job Ads Study

We found peer job wage offers ranged from $12.00 to $31.84 per hour. The table (below) includes the median (or middle) hourly wage that organizations could offer, not the wage organizations necessarily did offer. The median hourly wage that organizations could offer was $17.57. After removing crisis worker positions, the median hourly wage offer was $16.51. 

We used data from ZipRecruiter.com and Talent.com to compare Iowa's wage offers to those of other states because ZipRecruiter and Talent have algorithms to extract peer positions. We used Google Chrome’s free Instant Data Scraper Extension to download peer support worker data by State. Talent.com estimated that the average hourly wage offer for Iowa peer support workers was $15.47 (ZipRecruiter: $16.85 per hour). ZipRecruiter ranked Iowa 42nd among 50 states on hourly wage offers, while Talent.com ranked Iowa 41st among 46 states. Iowa peer worker wage offers are in the lowest wage quartile nationally. For the full report, including job titles, click here.

Iowa Peer Workforce Survey

We received funding from the Telligen Community Initiative to understand Iowa peer worker experiences and how they relate to their well-being, job satisfaction, and intention to stay or leave their organizations. We defined peer workers as adults with lived experience (mental health or substance use challenge) who are currently employed as a peer support worker in Iowa. Using data from 182 peer workers, we found the average hourly wage ($17.58) was nearly identical to the median hourly wage offer ($17.57) in our Iowa Peer Job Ads Study Report. We’ll report additional findings on Iowa’s peer support workers in future newsletters.