New Jersey by the numbers
In New Jersey, the median worker earns $57,230 a year, the typical home is worth $427,600 and carries $9,541 of property tax, and the average household pays $160 a month for electricity at 23.27¢ per kilowatt-hour.
Northeast PJM Retail choice statewide
Energy
New Jersey buys default supply through the Basic Generation Service auction, an annual competitive process whose results are approved by the Board of Public Utilities and then applied to bills. The 2025 and 2026 auctions cleared substantially higher than their predecessors, and the reason sits one level up, in PJM's capacity market.
PJM pays generators to be available, not just to produce, and the auction that sets those payments cleared at record levels for the 2025/2026 and 2026/2027 delivery years. Demand growth from data centres, retirements of older fossil plants, and slow interconnection of new resources all tightened the reserve margin, and the price responded. Every PJM state absorbed some version of that increase. New Jersey, Maryland, Ohio, Illinois, Pennsylvania and the District of Columbia all show it in the same year.
New Jersey compounds it with high delivery costs: dense suburban distribution, aggressive storm hardening after Sandy, and a societal benefits charge funding efficiency and solar programmes.
Averaged across the twelve months to May 2026, New Jersey households used 672 kilowatt-hours a month and paid $160. At the state median wage that is about 5.8 hours of work a month to keep the lights on. For heating, gas is still cheaper to run than a heat pump here, by about $8.57 per million BTU.
Work and pay
The median New Jersey worker earned $57,230 in 2024, 15.6% above the national median. What distinguishes a state's labour market is rarely its biggest occupations, which are retail and food service everywhere, but what it has disproportionately.
| Occupation | Concentration | Median pay |
|---|---|---|
| Shampooers | 5.71× | $31,470 |
| Therapists, All Other | 4.75× | $90,280 |
| Packers and Packagers, Hand | 4.59× | $42,770 |
| Automotive and Watercraft Service Attendants | 3.58× | $34,390 |
| Word Processors and Typists | 3.39× | $50,090 |
Property tax
The median New Jersey homeowner pays $9,541 a year on a home worth $427,600, an effective rate of 2.23% against a national 0.98%. Nobody sets that rate. It is what falls out of county, city, school district and special district levies applied to an assessed value, so the state figure is a weighted average of 21 counties rather than a posted number.
Cost of living
Prices in New Jersey run at 108.8 where the national average is 100, ranking it #4 of 51. Goods sit at 107.1, which is close to national almost everywhere because most goods are shipped and priced nationally. Rents sit at 134.3, and that is where states actually separate from one another. A median wage of $57,230 therefore buys what $52,601 buys nationally.
Metro areas priced separately: New York-Newark-Jersey City (112.6) , Trenton-Princeton (103.2) , Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington (102.6) , Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton (100.0) , Atlantic City-Hammonton (98.9) .
Housing
House prices in New Jersey rose 4.5% over the year to 2026 Q2, against a median across all states of +2.7%. Over ten years the index is +106.5%. Prices are at or near their record level.
Metro areas tracked here: Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton (+6.9%) .
Who supplies the power
10 utilities report residential service in New Jersey, together serving 3.6 million customers. Retail choice statewide.
New Jersey: common questions
What does it cost to live in New Jersey?
Prices overall run at 108.8 against a national average of 100, with rents at 134.3. The typical home is worth $427,600 and carries $9,541 a year in property tax, an effective rate of 2.23% against a national 0.98%. Electricity averages $160 a month at 23.27¢ per kilowatt-hour. Against that, the median wage is $57,230.
What is the property tax rate in New Jersey?
The effective rate is 2.23% of home value, from a median bill of $9,541. It is set locally rather than by the state, so the figure is a weighted outcome across 21 counties. County by county rates.
Does a salary go further in New Jersey?
The median wage of $57,230 buys what $52,601 buys nationally, once local prices are taken out. A state paying above the national median while charging above it for housing can leave a household no better off, and this is the arithmetic that shows which side of that line New Jersey falls on.
Is New Jersey expensive for electricity?
It ranks #13 of 51 jurisdictions on price at 23.27¢ per kilowatt-hour, +26.2% against the U.S. average. On the actual bill it ranks 21 of 51, because households there use 672 kWh a month against a national 871.
What is the median salary in New Jersey?
$57,230 across all occupations, about $27.51 an hour, covering 4,250,430 wage and salary workers as of 2024.
Who supplies electricity in New Jersey?
10 utilities report residential service, the largest being Public Service Elec & Gas Co with 2.0 million customers. Retail choice statewide.
Electricity May 2026, gas 2024, utilities 2024, wages 2024. All figures from federal statistical agencies. Methodology · Sources