Wages for highly skilled technology professionals remained strong this year, hovering around a six-year high in average wages, a U.S. job placement firm said Monday.

Pay rates continued to improve over last year, and in the middle of the second quarter were an average of $31.60 an hour, according to the Yoh Index of Technology Wages. The latest figure was only a slight dip from last quarter's $31.80 average hourly wage, which was the highest level since 2001.

While recent surveys showed tech professionals less confident about jobs, Yoh was seeing a "good, steady pace for hiring professionals with high-level skills and deep-rooted industry experience," Jim Lanzalotto, VP of strategy and marketing for the firm, said in a statement. "We should keep an eye out for more competitive wages to come during the remainder of 2007, and into 2008 as the marketplace continues to heat up."

Using January 2001 as the baseline of 100, the Yoh wage index for the second quarter of this year reached 112.93, which is 4.29% higher than the same period last year.

The 12 highest paying jobs in alphabetical order were aerospace engineer, $49.98 an hour; civil engineer, $38.73; clinical research associate, $49.42; database administrator, $57.36; functional consultant, $78.40; hardware designer, $65.63; Java developer, $55.62; mechanical engineer, $42.47; network administrator, $38.77; project manager, $58.65; SAP technical consultant, $85.53; and SAS programmer, $52.77.

Yoh bases its index on data compiled by its 75 U.S. field offices. The data includes the employment activity of as many as 5,000 technology professionals outsourced on short- and long-term projects by more than 1,000 top employers in aviation, engineering, IT, manufacturing, scientific, telecommunications and utility industries.

Yoh is a part of Yoh Services LLC, a Day & Zimmermann Co.