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California training programs, and what happened to the people who took them

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Fire Inspectors and Investigators

SOC 33-2021 · 2024-2034

Inspect buildings to detect fire hazards and enforce local ordinances and state laws, or investigate and gather facts to determine cause of fires and explosions.

How the U.S. Department of Labor describes this work. Published in English only.

What California expects of this job

Typical pay in California
$101,743per year
Projected openings
1,410
Projected change
+7.7%
Usually needs
Postsecondary non-degree award

Skills this work uses most

O*NET, the U.S. Department of Labor's occupation database, rates how important each of these is to this work, and they are listed in that order, most important first. The ratings themselves are not shown, because the data carries the number without the scale it was measured on. The names are as published, in English.

  1. Active Listening
  2. Writing
  3. Critical Thinking
  4. Speaking
  5. Social Perceptiveness
  6. Reading Comprehension

Pay by region

RegionTypical pay in CaliforniaProjected openings
Oakland-Fremont-Berkeley MD (Alameda and Contra Costa Counties)$134,662180
Los Angeles-Long Beach-Glendale MD (Los Angeles County)$98,223150
Santa Maria-Santa Barbara MSA (Santa Barbara County)$88,31170
Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario MSA (Riverside and San Bernardino Counties)$85,247150

What the pay actually ranges across

The lowest-paid tenth earn under
$61,602
A quarter earn under
$81,380
Half earn under
$101,743
Three quarters earn under
$125,839
The highest-paid tenth earn over
$154,404

A median is one point. These are the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics' 2026 figures for California, and they say how far apart the people doing this job actually are. Read them as the spread across everyone already in the work — not as a starting wage and not as a promise about where anyone lands.

Similar work

O*NET, the U.S. Department of Labor's occupation database, names these as occupations involving work similar to this one — its own reading of the job, not a grouping by code. They keep O*NET's order, and only those California publishes a projection for are shown.

OccupationTypical pay in CaliforniaProjected openingsProjected change
Firefighters$87,27625,610+5%
Health and Safety Engineers, Except Mining Safety Engineers and Inspectors$135,2221,590+4%
First-Line Supervisors of Firefighting and Prevention Workers$130,8635,620+4.9%
Occupational Health and Safety Specialists$105,71919,550+16.4%
Construction and Building Inspectors$104,03414,650+2.1%
Compliance Officers$98,60743,870+7%

Programs that train for this job — 23