Salary Survey Extra is a series of dispatches that give added insight into the findings of both our annual Salary Survey and our smaller Salary Survey PLUS polls. These posts contain previously unpublished Salary Survey data.

As a general rule, most of the certified professionals who respond to our surveys live and work in the United States. So when we turn to our most recent survey for additional insights — still, in this case, the Salary Survey PLUS from our October issue that focused on networking certifications — we often end up dealing with U.S.-specific data.

Such is the case today, as we take a look at data from the survey to identify the top networking employment hotspots among all U.S. states. Based on our survey data, 10 states account for almost exactly three-fourths of all employment among certified networking professionals in the United States.

For each of the following 10 states, we identified the percentage of U.S. survey respondents who call that state home. Then we calculated the average annual salary among all certified networking professionals who reside there. Here's what the picture looks like:

It turns out that the state with the largest population of certified networking professionals, Texas, may not be the place that most networking professionals would choose to work. The average annual salary of $69,850 is only the seventh-best figure among the 10 states with the most certified networking professionals.

Virginia, on the other hand, has only the eighth largest population of certified networking professionals, but pays them well, indeed. The average annual salary of a certified networking professional in Virginia is pretty close to six figures, a revelation that should draw interest from across all U.S. states.

Meanwhile California can add another feather to its veritable headdress of reasons why people should (and do) choose to live there. It pairs up a large networking workforce with a solid fourth-place finish in the average annual salary column.