Vermont pays mid-pack for line work; the Northeast premium you see in Massachusetts and New York does not fully cross the border, so compare against the power lineman salary by state guide before you move. Vermont is not a right-to-work state, and outside line work here is IBEW territory; use the IBEW local finder to sign the right book. The state is small enough that a handful of utilities own nearly every mile of line, so who you work for matters more than where you live.
Vermont has no large investor-owned utility of the Duke or FPL scale. Your realistic employers are one dominant IOU, a co-op, municipal departments, and the contractors who back them up, which changes the hiring bar and the overtime picture. See how those employer types differ on hiring.
The largest employer of linemen in the state, covering most of central and southern Vermont.
Rural northern territory, long drives, small crews, and heavy tree exposure.
City-owned department with the state's densest service area and the fewest open seats.
Line construction and vegetation crews that surge into Vermont after ice events.
Vermont sits near the national median and below neighboring Massachusetts and New York, so linemen here often close the gap with winter overtime and out-of-state storm work pay rather than base rate.
Ice storms and heavy wet snow from roughly November through March drive most restoration work, with spring flooding and summer thunderstorms taking down trees onto rural lines the rest of the year.
Most Vermont linemen start as groundmen with a co-op or contractor, then apply into an IBEW outside lineman apprenticeship; with so few utilities, apprentice slots open rarely, so many candidates cross into New Hampshire or New York to start.