While the majority of the economy continues to struggle amidst the current economic recession, one industry has continued to consistently add jobs.
An American City Business Journal analysis of employment data from the United States Department of Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics found the education and health services industry has added almost a quarter-million jobs in the country’s 100 biggest labor markets since last year.
Not surprisingly, the New York City area has seen the biggest gains. The area, which includes parts of New Jersey, Connecticut and Pennsylvania, added 34,000 education and health jobs from June 2008 to June of this year. The Dallas-Fort Worth, Boston and Los Angeles area each added at least 12,000 jobs in the industry.
Richmond had the highest increase at 10 percent, followed by 6.6 percent in Dallas-Fort Worth and 6.4 percent in Indianapolis.
Overall, the 100 markets have added 232,600 education and health jobs since last year, an increase of 1.8 percent. Of the top 100 markets, 87 had higher job totals in the education and health services industry from 2008 to 2009, while five markets remained unchanged and eight experienced job losses.
The top 10 metro areas that experienced year-over-year gains in the education and health services industry include:
- New York City by 34,200
- Dallas-Fort Worth by 21,400
- Boston by 12,900
- Los Angeles by 12,000
- Atlanta by 8,900
- Richmond by 8,000
- Indianapolis by 7,500
- Columbus by 6,300
- Houston by 6,300
- Minneapolis-St. Paul by 6,300
During July, the education and health services industry had a total of 19,269,000 workers and an unemployment rate of 6.1 percent, according to the BLS. The industry had 508,000 job openings and made 601,000 hires during June.
