The median advertised pay for a travel PCU (progressive care unit) contract in Illinois is $2,269 per week, with the middle half between $2,229 and $2,523. Measured across 19 active travel PCU contracts in Illinois at 11 facilities, as of 2026-09-15.
Advertised weekly totals, taxable base plus tax-free stipends. Not take-home.
That is 0 percent over the $2,268 national median for travel PCU contracts.
Illinois is not a Nurse Licensure Compact state, so you need a Illinois license to work here even if you hold a multistate license. The compact state list explains which states issue one.
| Weekly rate | Open contracts |
|---|---|
| $2,100 to $2,250 | 9 |
| $2,250 to $2,400 | 5 |
| $2,400 to $2,550 | 0 |
| $2,550 to $2,700 | 1 |
| $2,700 to $2,850 | 0 |
| $2,850 to $3,000 | 2 |
| $3,000 and up | 2 |
All 19 open contracts, banded by advertised weekly rate. The outer bands are open-ended so nothing falls outside the chart.
Illinois has the 19th highest price level of the 51 states and territories the Bureau of Economic Analysis measures: 0 percent under the national average overall. The premium is concentrated in housing, at 6 percent under, while goods sit 4 percent over and services 0 percent over. That matters more than the headline number, because housing is the part a tax-free stipend is meant to cover and the rest comes out of taxed wages.
| Metro | Open contracts | Median weekly | Rent, 1 bed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Peoria | 4 | $2,234 | $790/mo |
| Galesburg | 3 | $2,239 | — |
| Chicago | 2 | $3,030 | $1,590/mo |
| Rock Island | 2 | $2,381 | $800/mo |
| Urbana | 2 | $2,213 | $870/mo |
| BLOOMINGTON | 1 | $2,232 | $840/mo |
| Lake Forest | 1 | $2,199 | $2,340/mo |
| Maryville | 1 | $2,664 | — |
| Mt. Vernon | 1 | $2,365 | — |
| Rockford | 1 | $2,186 | $890/mo |
| Springfield | 1 | $2,343 | $930/mo |
Rent is the one-bedroom Fair Market Rent HUD publishes for that metro, which is what a housing stipend is trying to cover. The open-contract count beside each metro is the sample its median rests on, and outside the largest markets that sample is small: a median over one or two contracts is a single posting's rate rather than a market rate, so read the count first.
Browse the board for current PCU assignments in Illinois.
Drawn from the postings that state a requirement, which is not all of them, so each figure carries the number it was measured from. Your recruiter confirms the specifics for a given contract before submission.
All 42 states with PCU openings