First-quarter figures analysed by PayScale, an online portal founded by former Microsoft man Joe Giordano which tracks wage data worldwide, revealed the oil and gas industry experienced the lowest annual wage growth of any industry at just 0.8%.

Oil and gas employees have experienced a 19% increase in wages since 2006, the most of any industry.

Workers are also less willing to negotiate for wage increases as companies have changed their hiring plans in the new low oil price environment, according to a new Rigzone industry survey released this week.

More than 55% of global hiring managers reported they had not seen an increase in the number of candidates asking for more money in the last three months, according to Rigzone's latest Global Hiring Survey.

While the global candidate pool is getting larger, companies remain cautious, Rigzone said, with many companies continuing to scale back on hiring plans due to ongoing market volatility and low oil prices.

Polling industry hiring managers from across the globe, 47% of survey participants said they had reduced their hiring plans over the past three months, while an additional 16% said they had halted their hiring plans completely for the time being. Only 18% said that present market conditions had caused them to increase their hiring plans over this same timeframe.

International oil and gas job board OilCareers.com has integrated this week into Rigzone, with the combined strengths now sitting under one global platform, operating extensively across Europe, the Middle East, the Asia Pacific region and the Americas.