Boston Job Growth Trails Average, IT Outperforms
With summer underway, it is encouraging to hear that the season will find many former job seekers happily employed. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ recent report, both nationally, and in Massachusetts, unemployment rates have continued to decrease. While the Bay State’s jobless rate consistently comes in well under the national average, analysts are quick to point out that the Greater Boston area is not recovering as quickly as other metro areas, or the nation on average.
Across Massachusetts, more than 7,500 new jobs were created in May. For the month, unemployment was 6% statewide and 8.2% nationally. However, when you compare employment growth rates, it becomes apparent that the Greater Boston area is not keeping pace with several other metro areas or the national average.
From April 2011 to April 2012, total employment rose .9% in the Greater Boston area, or .4% less than the national growth rate of 1.3%. When ranked against the nation’s 12 largest metro areas, Boston held seventh place by employment growth rate. Houston, Dallas, San Francisco, and Detroit were the top four fastest growing metro areas year-over-year, while Philadelphia was the slowest growing, seeing almost no growth.
On a finer level, though, Boston again shines. While nationally the Information Technology (IT) sector shrunk by 1.6% on average, Boston’s IT sector grew by 2.5%. Naturally, we would all love to see IT holding strong country-wide, but still we cannot help but take pride in Boston’s 
ability to out-perform the national average so dramatically. It truly is a testament to the areas’ technology professionals, entrepreneurs, investors, and support networks.
If you are an engineer, programmer, or other tech professional looking for work, or simply ready for a change, a great new opportunity is likely just around the corner. The CareerEncore team would love the chance to help you take the first step. I’m looking forward to spending the summer working with some of the city’s most talented professionals. With any luck, Boston jobless rate will sink even lower in the months to come.
For more information about Boston’s employment performance, check out: http://bit.ly/MmdeAL, http://bit.ly/NMKL95, and http://bit.ly/MKmlrf
Image credit: Graph (http://bit.ly/ND3YsJ), Hiring (http://bit.ly/MmiF24)
About CareerEncore:
CareerEncore is a boutique recruiting firm dedicated to providing Greater Boston-area technology companies with exceptional talent. If you’ve proven yourself at a tech-driven company, functional experience aside (development, systems, marketing, sales, finance, operations, executive suite, etc.), we can help you find your next great opportunity. In particular, we are always looking for skilled software engineers, programmers, and developers. With all of our candidates and clients, we forge lasting partnerships. Our commitment to understanding your needs, coupled with our years of industry experience, uniquely enables us to successfully match talent with opportunity.
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