Four Louisiana cities make national ranking for slowest growing wages, two others show big gains  

Workers in Monroe and Lakes Charles are seeing their income climb, checking in at 14th and 22nd, respectively, in USA Today’s top 25 ranking of U.S. metro areas with the quickest-growing per capita incomes.   
On the flip side, the New Orleans-Metairie (24th), Shreveport-Bossier City (16), Houma-Thibodaux (5) and Lafayette (2) metro areas found themselves on the paper’s list of metro areas with per capita incomes shrinking the fastest.
Baton Rouge is the only Louisiana metro area to not make either list.
Nationally, total personal income in 2016 climbed for the third consecutive year, with the amount Americans took home increasing 1.1% to $14.6 trillion, up from $14.2 trillion in 2015. Factoring in population growth over the same period, per capita income inched up by a relatively modest 0.4%, and now stands at $44,450.
In New Orleans, per capita income declined 1.6% from 2015 to ‘16, while the population increased 0.5% over that period.
Per capita income in Shreveport-Bossier City fell for the first time in five years, falling to $45,168, a 2.7% drop from 2015.
In the Houma-Thibodaux metro the decline was 6.4% and Lafayette saw a retreat of 7.9%, the largest drop of any U.S. metro area after Midland, Texas.
On the positive, Lake Charles’ per capita income grew 3% year-over, to $46,070 in 2016. Monroe saw its per capita income climb for the third consecutive year, rising 3.4% to $40,614, crossing the $40,000 threshold for the first time.
See the list of cities with fastest shrinking wages here, and the list of the fastest growing wages here.