Job Market Update - Where the Jobs Are
Top ten cities seeing job growth in 2009, by Kristen Bennett
Not having any luck finding a new job in your area? Maybe it’s time to consider relocating.
Forbes.com just released a new study in cooperation with Joel Kotkin of NewGeography and Michael Shires, an associate professor at Pepperdine University. Over the past five years, their study, based off of the Metropolitan Statistical Areas by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, has analyzed job growth across the United States by region and industry. Forbes has recently published their findings, and can agree on at least one point—everything is bigger in Texas.
#1: Austin-Round Rock, Texas
Of the top ten large cities with the best employment opportunities and job growth, the Austin area leads Texas—and the nation. Between 2004 and 2008, the area’s job growth was extraordinary, and even between 2007 and 2008, growth and employment was maintained well above the national average. While manufacturing positions dwindled and dropped by a third between 2000 and 2008, education, healthcare, and hospitality have flourished. Despite some job growth stagnation, the employment rate that the area has maintained is impressive enough to have it crowned the No. 1 big city nationwide.
#2: Houston-Sugar Land-Baytown, Texas
Houston (including the surrounding Sugar Land and Baytown areas) comes second on Forbes’ list. The city, the fourth largest in the nation, saw modest growth across such industries as natural resources, mining, and construction, while education, health services, and wholesale prevented losses. Those seeking manufacturing jobs should look here—manufacturing job growth managed to increase over the past twelve months, a surprising and impressive fact in comparison with the rest of the large American cities. During the first half of 2008, Texas overall saw increased manufacturing jobs as oil prices and construction boomed.
#3: San Antonio, Texas
As the seventh-largest city nationwide, San Antonio comes in third on the top ten. Like most of the cities across the nation, education and healthcare are an enormous contributor to the area’s current employment rate. However, between 2000 and 2008, the city’s cumulative growth for education and healthcare was the best of nearly anywhere in the nation, and thus far there has been no decline. However, overall job growth was minimal in 2008, in a dizzying fall from its impressive boom between 2004 and 2007.
# 4: Fort Worth-Arlington, Texas
Despite the fact that some industries in Fort Worth have been quieting down, the city’s economic outlook remains comparatively healthy. Between 2000 and 2008, Fort Worth’s extraordinary cumulative growth fell between 2004 and 2007. Last year brought job losses in the city’s information technology and manufacturing industries, and transportation held out with minimal growth. Given the massive losses seen in other industries across the Midwest, Fort Worth’s otherwise steady numbers place it fourth in the nation for best employment possibilities, particularly as a stable place to work.
# 5: Dallas-Plano-Irving, Texas
Last in the Texas dynasty is Dallas and the surrounding Plano-Irving area. Though the city has experienced minute negative growth since 2007, large losses were from fields that had already begun to contract, such as manufacturing and wholesale. With Dallas as a major metropolis, education and government are the area’s key leaders in employment, as the city is surrounded by an enormous number of academic institutions and government facilities.
#6: Seattle-Bellvue-Everett, Washington
As far as large cities are concerned, Seattle is one of few metropolitan areas that is still seeing fast job growth in information technology. Information jobs increased between 2007 and 2008, and with 85,700 positions, it now outranks Atlanta and Chicago’s dwindling information-industry statistics. The area has also seen a rise in education and health care positions, reflected nationwide, though these industries have grown more moderately than the same in Texas. With the Microsoft Corporation’s national headquarters located in the area, if you’re in information technology, Seattle is where you want to be.
# 7: Salt Lake City, Utah
Between 2000 and 2008, the information technology industry in Salt Lake City downsized dramatically, half of the decline taking place between 2006 and 2007 alone. The city has enjoyed a recent turnaround, however, and since 2007, this rejuvenation has carried the city’s information-industry positions to 17,500 jobs city-wide. However, the area’s natural resources, mining, and construction sectors declined slightly between 2006 and 2007, and in 2008 took a nosedive. Despite certain blue-collar woes, its employment opportunities are better than the vast majority of large cities nationwide.
# 8: Raleigh-Cary, North Carolina
As the only city on the East Coast to appear on the list, Raleigh and the surrounding area dropped to No. 8 from No.1, where it ranked last year. Between 2000 and 2006, the city witnessed an information technology slump, but recovered between 2006 and 2007, and even managed some growth in 2008. Government has grown, as have other service industries, against the losses seen in natural resources, mining, constructing, and manufacturing. After the substantial cumulative growth seen in the financial sector since 2000, jobs have fallen slightly. Given the booming growth between 2004 and 2007, Raleigh lost only a small portion of its job positions since 2007, impressively above the national average.
#9: Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Oklahoma City has made a tremendous leap in popularity among large cities with the best employment opportunities. Employment has modestly increased last year, after a good growth rate between 2004 and 2007. In fact, natural resources, mining, and construction employment actually rose, and wholesale employment increased—remarkable giving their downturn in nearly all other large cities. Though not as strong as the gains earlier this decade, between 2007 and 2008 hospitality and leisure employment increased. Conventions and sporting events that draw people into the city have kept the area’s food, beverage, and hospitality fields up; if the hospitality industry is right for you, so is Oklahoma City.
#10: Portland-Vancouver-Beaverton, Oregon-Washington
Rounding out our top ten is the Portland-Vancouver-Beaverton area, the area has only seen a small decline in job growth from 2007 to 2008, and its education and health care industries have grown in the last 12 months. Its largest losses came from natural resources, mining, and construction with a tumble as its previously booming real estate sector slowed. Other losses came in transportation and utilities and manufacturing. Since 2006, its employment opportunities have grown steadily, and giving Portland enough to make the leap into the top ten of Forbes’ list.