CRA Bulletin

(See earlier posts on occupational employment projections by the Bureau of Labor Statistics for professional-level IT positions: overall estimates and by detailed occupation).

Although each BLS employment projection report covers a slightly different period, it is interesting to see how the forecasts have changed over time. The 2006-2016 projections for the IT workforce are lower both in terms of numbers and percent growth than those made in the report for 2004-2014. In the 2004-2014 report, BLS estimated that 1.04 million new jobs would be created– a 30.5 percent growth rate. In comparison, the report for 2006-2016 forecasts a lower growth rate in new jobs (24.1 percent) and fewer new jobs (854,000, or 18 percent lower than for 2004-2014). However, it does project more total job openings (1.64 million, or 10 percent more than in the 2004-2014 report).

It would be easy to see the series of lowered growth projections as signs of trouble within the IT workforce. But there are two other factors to consider: (1) in the 2006-2016 report, expectations for growth lowered also for the overall workforce, and (2) it probably has taken some time for the BLS to assess a relatively new group of occupations that is evolving rapidly (as seen also in the swings in computer science degree production). All in all, in each of its reports BLS predicted that the professional level IT occupations would enjoy high salaries and more than twice the growth rate of the overall workforce.

The 2006-2016 BLS projections are available at:
Monthly Labor Review, November 2007
http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2007/11/contents.htm
See in particular “Occupational employment projections to 2016.”

The 2004-2014 BLS projections are available at:
Monthly Labor Review, November 2005
http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2005/11/contents.htm
See in particular “Occupational employment projections to 2014.”

The 2002-2012 projections are at:
Monthly Labor Review, February 2004
http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2004/02/art5full.pdf

The 2000-2010 projections are at:
Monthly Labor Review, November 2001
http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2001/11/art4full.pdf

While the Bureau of Labor Statistics expects the professional IT workforce to grow at more than twice the rate of the overall workforce between 2006 and 2016, there is variation in projected changes among different IT occupations.

Although it cannot overshadow the significant growth projected for most professional-level IT workers, one of the most notable changes is the decline in the expected number of computer programmers. Among the 30 occupations with the largest projected job declines, computer programmers are one of only two occupations with salaries in the ‘very high’/$46,360+ category. (According to BLS, in May 2006 the median annual earnings of computer programmers were $65,510). In addition, programming is one of only two occupations among the 30 that typically require postsecondary education.

Why the drop in programmers? According to the report:

Computer programmers, the only occupation from the professional and related occupations on the list of the largest declining occupations, is expected to decline moderately as workers in other occupations acquire programming skills, as work is outsourced to foreign countries, and as some basic programming functions are automated.

The 2006-2016 BLS projections are available in the November 2007 Monthly Labor Review, http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/mlrhome.htm. See in particular “Occupational employment projections to 2016.”

The report’s reference to outsourcing appears to rely on the ACM report, Globalization and Offshoring of Software: http://www.acm.org/globalizationreport/

See also the Computer Programmers section of the BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook: http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos110.htm

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) estimates that the professional-level IT workforce will grow at more than twice the rate of the overall workforce between 2006 and 2016, creating 1 in 19 new jobs. In addition, many of these jobs will pay well.

Every two years, BLS releases workforce projections covering a 10-year period. The definition for the ‘professional IT workforce’ used here is that used by the Department of Commerce’s Office of Technology Policy (see the note below for more information).

In 2006, there were 3.5 million IT professionals out of a total workforce of 150.6 million. This part of the IT workforce is projected to add about 854,000 new jobs between 2006 and 2016, an increase of about 24%. Total job openings, which combine new jobs and net replacements, are projected to be 1.64 million for IT professionals. The overall workforce is expected to grow about 10% between 2006 and 2016, adding 15.6 million new jobs. This increases to 50.73 million jobs once net replacements are added in.

Five of the 30 occupations that are projected to grow the fastest (i.e., percent gain) between 2006 and 2016 are in the IT profession. Among the 30 fastest-growing occupations, 11 have median salary earnings of $46,360 or above, including all five IT occupations.

Three of the five IT occupations listed as the fastest growing also rank among the 30 that are projected to have the largest numeric growth. Only seven of these 30 have median salary earnings of $46,360 or more, including all three IT occupations.

Note: I have adopted the definition of ‘professional IT occupations’ that is used by the Department of Commerce’s Office of Technology Policy. This adds two occupations to the ten listed under the “Computer specialists” category (15-0000 through 15-1099) in the BLS tables: Computer and information system managers (11-3021) and Computer hardware engineers (17-2061).

The next two posts will provide more detail on projections for individual IT occupations and compare the 2006-2016 projections to those made for 2004-2014.

The 2006-2016 BLS projections are available in the November 2007 Monthly Labor Review, http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/mlrhome.htm. See in particular “Occupational employment projections to 2016.”

(See earlier posts on occupational employment projections by the Bureau of Labor Statistics for professional-level IT positions: on overall estimates and by detailed occupation).

Although each BLS employment projection report covers a slightly different period, it is interesting to see how the forecasts have changed over time. The 2004-2014 projections for the IT workforce are slightly lower both in terms of numbers and percent growth than those made in the report for 2002-2012. In the 2002-2012 report, BLS estimated that 1.15 million new jobs would be created– a 35 percent growth rate. Total job openings (new jobs plus openings created in order to replace workers who leave their jobs) were estimated at 1.6 million. In comparison, the report for 2004-2014 forecasts a lower growth rate in new jobs (30.5 percent), fewer new jobs (1.04 million, or 10 percent lower than for 2002-2012) and fewer total openings (1.49 million, or 7 percent lower than its previous report).

The reduced growth projections made for IT in the 2004-2014 report come on top of the significantly lower expectations BLS gave in its report for 2002-2012. In that, BLS cut back its projections significantly compared to what it had predicted in the report for 2000-2010. The estimated number of new jobs was lowered 47 percent from what had been predicted for 2000-2010 (2.16 million versus 1.15 million). As a result, the growth rate fell from 65.8 percent to 35.2 percent. The estimated total openings also were lowered, from 2.49 million to 1.6 million. (See a 2004 CRN article about this by John Sargent: http://www.cra.org/CRN/articles/may04/sargent.html).

Even when these declines are factored in, BLS still estimates that the number of new IT jobs will increase at more than twice the rate of total new jobs between 2004 and 2014 (30.5 percent versus 13 percent), accounting for 1 in 19 new openings and adding a million new workers.

The 2004-2014 BLS projections are available at:
Monthly Labor Review, November 2005
http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2005/11/contents.htm.
See in particular “Occupational employment projections to 2014.”

The 2002-2012 projections are at:
Monthly Labor Review, February 2004
http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2004/02/art5full.pdf

The 2000-2010 projections are at:
Monthly Labor Review, November 2001
http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2001/11/art4full.pdf

(See an earlier post for more background.)

Although the Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that the professional-level IT workforce will grow about 30 percent between 2004 and 2014, there is significant variation between specific IT occupations, which highlights how difficult it is to generalize about “IT".

NB: In an earlier version of this post, I included base employment data taken from the 2000 and 2002 reports. I found out that BLS discourages such comparisons.

The 2004-2014 BLS projections are available in the November 2005 Monthly Labor Review, http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2005/11/contents.htm.
See in particular “Occupational employment projections to 2014.”

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) estimates that the professional-level IT workforce will grow at more than twice the rate of the overall workforce between 2004 and 2014, creating 1 in 19 new jobs. In addition, many of these jobs will pay well.

Every two years, BLS releases workforce projections covering a 10-year period. The definition for the ‘professional IT workforce’ used here is that used by the Department of Commerce’s Office of Technology Policy (see the note below for more information).

The professional IT workforce is projected to add a little over a million new jobs between 2004 and 2014, an increase of about 30 percent. In 2004, there were 3.4 million IT professionals out of a total workforce of 145.6 million. The total workforce is expected to add 18.9 million jobs between 2004 and 2014.

Six of the 30 occupations that are projected to grow the fastest (i.e., percent gain) between 2004 and 2014 are in the IT profession. Among the 30 fastest-growing occupations, 17 have median salary earnings of $43,605 or above, including all six IT occupations.

Two of the six IT occupations listed as the fastest growing also rank among the 30 that are projected to have the largest numeric growth. Only seven of these 30 have median salary earnings of $43,605 or more, including both IT occupations.

Note: I have adopted the definition of ‘professional IT occupations’ that is used by the Department of Commerce’s Office of Technology Policy. This adds two occupations to the ten listed under the “Computer specialists” category (15-0000 through 15-1099) in the BLS tables: Computer and information system managers (11-3021) and Computer hardware engineers (17-2061).

The next two posts will provide more detail on projections for individual IT occupations and compare the 2004/2014 projections to those made for 2002/2012.

The 2004-2014 BLS projections are available in the November 2005 Monthly Labor Review, http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2005/11/contents.htm. See in particular “Occupational employment projections to 2014.”

There is great variation in how “high-tech” industries are identified. A recent report by Daniel Hecker in the Monthly Labor Review summarizes the different criteria that are used, including the proportion of scientists employed, R&D employment levels, production of high-tech products, and the use of high-tech production methods. It also describes the relevant surveys and how they differ in their coverage.

For his report, Hecker uses the 2002 North American Industry Classification System codes and one particular variable for identifying high-tech industries: a high proportion of technology-oriented occupations among an industry’s total employment. Among all industries, an average of 4.9 percent of total employment was made up of technology-oriented occupations. For his analysis, Hecker identifies 46 NAICS industries in 2002 that had at least twice this average and discusses them in comparison with other ways of defining high-tech industries.

NB:

The 46 high-tech industries accounted for 14.4 million wage and salary jobs in 2002, about 11 percent of total nonfarm wage and salary jobs in the economy. Employment in high-tech industries increased 7.5 percent over the 1992-2002 period, compared with 19.7 percent for the economy as a whole, and accounted for 5 percent of total employment growth.

In sum, high tech is projected to grow more slowly than the average for all industries [using the 2002-2012 BLS projections], but some high-tech industries, including computer-related services, management and technical consulting, and wireless telecommunications, are projected to grow very rapidly. High-tech manufacturing is expected to decline faster than overall manufacturing; however, output in many high-tech industries is projected to grow rapidly, and most high-tech industries and occupations have high earnings.

High-technology employment: a NAICS-based update (104 KB PDF), in the July 2005 Monthly Labor Review.

A previous post summarized an article about the Commerce Department’s revision of its IT employment projections for 2002-2012. Although they reduced their projections significantly from those in an earlier report, they still predict strong growth in several IT-related fields.

Of the thirty occupations that are predicted to be the fastest growing, seven are “computer-related.” All seven of these rank in the top salary category ($41,820+) – representing over half of the total number of occupations (13) with earnings this high.

Computer and mathematical occupations are projected to add 1.1 million jobs, and grow the fastest among the eight subgroups.

More than a third of new jobs will be in computer systems design and related services, and one-fifth will be in the information industry—primarily in software publishers, data processing and related, and Internet-related industries. In both groups, projected growth for these occupations exceeds 50 percent. In addition, in many industries, employment of these workers is projected to grow faster than the average for all occupations. Self-employed computer and mathematical workers are expected to increase 39.8 percent.

Two computer-related fields ("computer systems analysts” and “computer software engineers, applications") are also on the list of the top thirty occupations with the largest predicted job growth.

Monthly Labor Review, February 2004
http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2004/02/art5full.pdf
or visit
http://www.bls.gov/emp/home.htm

Workforce demand projections are notoriously inaccurate (see an earlier post about this). The Department of Commerce attempts projections every two years, covering ten year periods. The most recent projections were for 2002-2012. The Commerce Department’s John Sargent wrote an article for Computing Research News detailing the professional-level IT workforce portion of the report and how the numbers differed from those in the 2000-2010 report.

NB:

Between 1990 and 2000…professional-level IT occupations [experienced] an annual growth rate of 7.2 percent…compared with 1.3 percent for all occupations during the same period.

Between 2000 and 2002, OES data show that employment in the professional IT occupations fell 5.0 percent, significantly higher than total U.S. employment which fell only 1.7 percent.

…the decline was not uniform across professional IT occupations during this period. Some IT occupations grew—computer systems analysts (1.0 percent), network systems and data communications analysts (11.9 percent), and computer hardware engineers (5.5 percent). Network and computer systems administrators declined only slightly (0.6 percent). And other IT occupations experienced larger declines—computer programmers (13.8 percent) and computer support specialists (8.4 percent).

[For 2002-2012:] a projected annual growth rate [among professional-level IT occupations] of 3.1 percent, more than twice that of the overall U.S. annual job growth of 1.4 percent. BLS projects a total of 1.6 million job openings for the professional IT occupations during the ten-year period.

BLS projections for 2002-2012 represent a decreased expectation for employment growth in the professional IT occupations compared with the agency’s 2000-2010 projections. In its 2000-2010 projections, BLS projected 2.15 million new jobs in the professional IT occupations. In contrast, BLS projects that only 1.15 million new IT jobs will be created during the 2002-2012 period, a reduction in projected job growth of nearly one-half.

The full article, An Overview of Past and Projected Employment Changes in the Professional IT Occupations, is online at http://www.cra.org/CRN/articles/may04/sargent.html