SALARY BY CATEGORY:

Production Manager

While executives in the production department got their biggest raises in 5 years, salaries declined for managers. As a group, pay decreased 3 percent to $59,600.

Categories related to experience were the only ones to see major drop-offs though. Most saw minor shifts.

Salaries fell by as much as $15,900 for those with the least amount of experience in the industry, at a company or in a certain role. 

Those with more experience (and those over age 40) didn’t see commensurate gains though. For the most part, their pay stayed flat.

Hours worked per week had been loosely correlated to earnings in the past—last year those working more than 50 hours and those working less than 40 hours were separated by just $1,100—but the gap approached $17,000 in 2013.

Size also mattered for production managers, but not as much as it did at the executive level. Those at companies with more than $10 million in revenue or working for publications with more than $3 million in revenue had 17- to 22-percent higher salaries than those at smaller operations.

Pay between production managers at consumer, b-to-b and association publications hasn’t been much different historically, but the gaps have increased in each of the last two years. They’re still small—just $6,200 separate the segments—but it’s a trend that bears watching.