---
title: "Parking Enforcement Worker"
description: "Patrol assigned area, such as public parking lot or city streets to issue tickets to overtime parking violators and illegally parked vehicles."
canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/parking-enforcement-worker"
last-updated: "2026-10-09T10:57:55.138Z"
---

# Parking Enforcement Worker

**Category:** Protective Service · **SOC code:** 33-3041 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 33-3041.00

Patrol assigned area, such as public parking lot or city streets to issue tickets to overtime parking violators and illegally parked vehicles.

Also advertised as: Meter Maid; Parking Control Officer; Parking Enforcement Officer (PEO); Parking Enforcement Technician (Parking Enforcement Tech); Parking Enforcer; Parking Officer; Parking Patroller; Parking Regulation Enforcement Officer.

## At a glance

- **Median annual wage:** $46,730 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)
- **Median hourly wage:** $22.47/hr
- **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $35,130 to $75,340, with the middle half between $39,870 and $60,490
- **Total US employment:** 9,050
- **Typical entry education:** High school
- **Preparation required:** Little or no preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone 1-2: Very Little to Some Preparation Needed"
- **Projected growth:** -1.1% over 2025–2035 (BLS EP, 2025–2035)
- **Annual job openings:** 800 openings a year
- **AI-resilience score:** 50/100 — a NueCareer heuristic over O\*NET work activities and context, not a BLS or O\*NET figure

## Pay

National wage distribution, BLS OEWS, May 2025, across 9,050 US jobs.

| Percentile | Annual wage |
| --- | --- |
| 10th | $35,130 |
| 25th | $39,870 |
| 50th (median) | $46,730 |
| 75th | $60,490 |
| 90th | $75,340 |
| Mean (average) | $51,190 |

### Pay by state

The 15 highest-paying states, by median annual wage. The cost-of-living-adjusted column divides the state median by that state's BEA Regional Price Parity, so the columns answer different questions: the first is what the job pays there, the second is what that pay buys there.

| State | Median annual wage | Cost-of-living adjusted | Employment |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| WA | $68,120 | $63,656 | 190 |
| CA | $62,280 | $56,250 | 1,710 |
| OR | $59,810 | $57,865 | 80 |
| NV | $55,040 | $55,052 | 40 |
| UT | $52,670 | $53,275 | 70 |
| MA | $51,980 | $49,150 | 300 |
| NH | $51,580 | $49,518 | 70 |
| WI | $49,060 | $52,139 | 150 |
| OH | $48,510 | $52,288 | 110 |
| CO | $47,910 | $46,491 | 100 |
| MT | $47,750 | $50,452 | 40 |
| NY | $47,590 | $44,097 | 730 |
| VT | $47,460 | $48,449 | 30 |
| IL | $47,080 | $47,100 | Not published by BLS |
| VA | $46,840 | $46,329 | 130 |

26 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 41 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/parking-enforcement-worker/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/parking-enforcement-worker.

## Outlook

BLS projects employment to move from 9,400 in the 2025–2035 base year to 9,300 by the end of the cycle — a loss of 100 jobs, or -1.1%. Declining: -1.1% against 3.5% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 800 openings a year are expected on average, counting openings from growth as well as from workers leaving the occupation permanently. Source: BLS EP, 2025–2035.

## How to get in

- **Typical entry education:** High school diploma or equivalent (BLS Employment Projections).
- **Preparation level:** Little or no preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone 1-2: Very Little to Some Preparation Needed".
- **Related work experience typically required:** None.
- **Typical on-the-job training:** Short-term on-the-job training.

## What the work involves

- Write warnings and citations for illegally parked vehicles.
- Maintain assigned equipment and supplies, such as hand-held citation computers, citation books, rain gear, tire-marking chalk, and street cones.
- Maintain close communications with dispatching personnel, using two-way radios or cell phones.
- Observe and report hazardous conditions, such as missing traffic signals or signs, and street markings that need to be repainted.
- Patrol an assigned area by vehicle or on foot to ensure public compliance with existing parking ordinance.
- Identify vehicles in violation of parking codes, checking with dispatchers when necessary to confirm identities or to determine whether vehicles need to be booted or towed.
- Respond to and make radio dispatch calls regarding parking violations and complaints.
- Provide information to the public regarding parking regulations and facilities, and the location of streets, buildings and points of interest.

## Skills and knowledge

### Essential skills

- Speaking — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Monitoring — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Listening — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Critical Thinking — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Reading Comprehension — importance 2.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Writing — importance 2.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Learning — importance 2.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Learning Strategies — importance 2.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Transferable skills

These are the skills that carry into other occupations, and they drive the related-occupation and career-change rankings on this site.

- Social Perceptiveness — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Time Management — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Coordination — importance 2.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Service Orientation — importance 2.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Persuasion — importance 2.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Negotiation — importance 2.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Complex Problem Solving — importance 2.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Judgment and Decision Making — importance 2.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Knowledge areas

- English Language — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Public Safety and Security — importance 3.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Law and Government — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Psychology — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Customer and Personal Service — importance 3.2 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Computers and Electronics — importance 2.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Abilities

- Oral Expression — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speech Clarity — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Comprehension — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Comprehension — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Far Vision — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Expression — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

## Who it suits

O\*NET rates every occupation on the six Holland (RIASEC) interest areas, on a 1–7 scale. This occupation's strongest areas are Realistic (R), Conventional (C), Enterprising (E).

| Interest area | Score (1–7) |
| --- | --- |
| R — Realistic | 6.37 |
| C — Conventional | 5.11 |
| E — Enterprising | 3.25 |
| S — Social | 2.61 |
| I — Investigative | 1.43 |
| A — Artistic | 1.00 |

### Personality fit

These scores are **derived by NueCareer**, not published by any government agency: they are cosine similarities between a personality type's trait profile and this occupation's O\*NET interest and work-style ratings, expressed 0–100. Treat them as a starting point for exploration, not as evidence that a type belongs in a job.

| Type | Fit score (0–100) |
| --- | --- |
| ISTJ | 85.4 |
| ESTJ | 83.5 |
| ISFJ | 79.4 |
| ESFJ | 70.4 |
| ESTP | 62.2 |

Best-fitting types: ISTJ, ESTJ.

## Related occupations

O\*NET's primary related occupations, in its own ranked order.

- [Parking Attendant](https://nuecareer.com/careers/parking-attendant) — median $35,150
- [Security Guard](https://nuecareer.com/careers/security-guard) — median $38,020
- [Transit and Railroad Police](https://nuecareer.com/careers/transit-and-railroad-police) — median $90,230
- [Railroad Conductor and Yardmaster](https://nuecareer.com/careers/railroad-conductor-and-yardmaster) — median $78,000
- [Shuttle Driver and Chauffeur](https://nuecareer.com/careers/shuttle-driver-and-chauffeur) — median $37,290
- [Highway Maintenance Worker](https://nuecareer.com/careers/highway-maintenance-worker) — median $50,260
- [Dispatcher](https://nuecareer.com/careers/dispatcher) — median $50,340
- [Transportation Vehicle, Equipment and Systems Inspector, Except Aviation](https://nuecareer.com/careers/transportation-vehicle-equipment-and-systems-inspector) — median $92,100
- [Traffic Technician](https://nuecareer.com/careers/traffic-technician) — median $59,090
- [Crossing Guard and Flagger](https://nuecareer.com/careers/crossing-guard-and-flagger) — median $38,100

## Sources

- **O\*NET** — O\*NET 31.0 Database, August 2026. https://www.onetcenter.org/database.html
- **BLS OEWS** — BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. https://www.bls.gov/oes/
- **BLS EP** — BLS Employment Projections, Table 1.2, 2025–2035. https://www.bls.gov/emp/
- **BEA RPP** — BEA Regional Price Parities by State, 2024. https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area

---

This bank includes information from the O\*NET 31.0 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. NueCareer has transformed the data by joining it to BLS wage and projection data and deriving facet, personality-fit and AI-resilience scores. BLS and BEA data are public domain (17 U.S.C. §105).

O\*NET content is used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). How these figures are sourced and derived: https://nuecareer.com/careers/methodology

JSON representation of this page: https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/parking-enforcement-worker