Technology-related employment still going strong, unemployment rate for IT jobs dropping to 2%

Technology-related employment and hiring opportunities continue to expand, according to an analysis by CompTIA. December’s technology employment gains bucked the generally underwhelming national employment trend.

Technology industry companies added 11,000 workers in December, data from “Employment Situation” report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reveals. It’s the 13th consecutive month of tech employment growth at the industry level.

Technology employment at the occupation level throughout the economy increased by 180,000 positions as the unemployment rate for IT jobs dropped to 2%.

The nation’s employers also stepped up their search for additional tech workers in December, with an estimated 332,564 job postings for open positions, 22,500 more than in November and the highest monthly total since March 2020.

“This undoubtedly sounds like a broken record, but there is no escaping the influence the pandemic continues to exert over hiring decisions and business investments,” said Tim Herbert, EVP for research and market intelligence at CompTIA. “Adaptation remains a driving force for organizations expanding their tech workforces in areas such as cloud infrastructure, remote support, data science and cybersecurity.”

Technology employment by geography and industry

The search for additional tech workers is widespread by both geography and industry, analysis of December job posting data from EMSI-Burning Glass Technologies Labor Insights reveals.

Eight metropolitan areas saw the number of tech job postings increase by more than 1,000 in December over November, from Dallas (15,959 total job postings) and Houston (6,331) in the Southwest, to Los Angeles (14,229) and Seattle (8,091) on the West Coast, to Atlanta (11,808) and Tampa (4,925) in the Southeast.

Among industries, professional scientific and technical services (53,603), finance and insurance (35,039), manufacturing (26,629) and information (17,755) listed the largest numbers of open positions last month.

Within the tech sector, December’s new hiring was led by growth in the IT services and custom software development occupation category (+10,200). Modest job gains were recorded in the categories of other information services, including search engines (+1,900) and data processing, hosting and related services (+1,600). Employment in the telecommunications and computer and electronic products manufacturing categories declined.

Source: https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2022/01/12/technology-employment/