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Plumber shortage in West Virginia: the licensed-supply numbers
What the West Virginia register actually shows, by tier and per capita, updated nightly.
As of 2026-08-09, West Virginia carries 5,514 licensed plumbers
on its state register, or 311.5 per 100,000 residents.
5,514
licensed plumbers
311.5
per 100k residents
#11
density rank of 42
West Virginia does not issue a separate apprentice license for this trade, so no pipeline ratio is published here. The tier counts below are what the register itself records.
By credential tier
Every plumber license on the West Virginia register, normalized to one ladder.
Tier
Licensed
Share
Journeyman
2,080
38%
Master
3,434
62%
Against comparable states
States nearest West Virginia on licensed plumbers per capita.
State
Licensed plumbers
Per 100k
West Virginia
5,514
311.5
Massachusetts
24,466
349.4
New Hampshire
4,709
335.9
Minnesota
17,925
312.4
South Dakota
2,677
291.2
Arkansas
8,846
288.4
Hawaii
3,329
232.0
Counts, not a capacity opinion. We publish the licensed supply and the pipeline
ratio; whether a market can absorb a given project is a judgement for the reader, not a claim we make.
Frequently asked
Is there a plumbers shortage in West Virginia?
Reporting on the shortage rarely states how many are actually licensed. West Virginia carries 5,514 licensed plumbers on its register as of 2026-08-09, or 311.5 per 100,000 residents. Readers can weigh that supply against demand directly.
How many licensed plumbers does West Virginia have?
5,514 on the state register as of 2026-08-09, including 3,434 at master level.
Where does the shortage narrative come from?
Industry analyses project national shortfalls of hundreds of thousands of skilled-trades workers against data-center and electrification demand. Those are demand-side estimates; the figure here is the licensed supply on the register today.
New licenses, ladder upgrades, classification changes and lapses, by market and credential tier. Read the quarterly free, or license the underlying data.