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IT Jobs in Washington, DC
By admin | July 28, 2008
Finding technology intensive Washington DC jobs shouldn’t be difficult for the foreseeable future, according to a recent American Electronic Association report. The organization found that the capital city is the second largest center for such jobs in the nation, topped only by the New York metro area.
Currently this industry employees over 295,000 DC residents. When compared to 2001, that is a 2.6 percent increase in employment in this industry. The largest portion of these jobs are in the field of computer system design, which accounts for 137,000 positions. The report found that DC is the leading region in the nation for this specific job.
The number of high-tech positions in the area made city fifth in the nation for job concentration. Employees in these fields are also making more than those in many other cities. AEA’s report found that DC is third in the U.S. as gar as payroll for these jobs goes. Altogether, businesses fork out approximately $27.4 billion to high-tech professionals, according to statistics from 2006. Nationwide the industry added somewhere around 90,000 jobs during the course of last year.
The largest problem for high-tech employers in the DC area and throughout the nation is the fact that fewer students are choosing to major in the fields of math and science. This makes finding the right workers for a variety of job openings difficult.
Despite this, jobs in Washington DC continues to attract a larger number of professionals in such fields that most areas can. Michael Black, assistant professor of computer science at American University, attributes this to the high concentration of lawmakers and federal agencies. “If you want to get a contract from the Department of Defense or homeland security or any number of these, this is the right place to be,” said Black.
He believes that the number of high-tech jobs in DC will continue to grow as will associated industries. “I don’t think we’ve seen all the applications of computers yet,” he said.
Black agrees that that largest problem is finding workers to fill job vacancies in this industry. “In terms of international students, the U.S. is shooting itself in the foot,” he explained. “I have a number of international students that are having a tough time [getting visas]. That’s a real problem….these students may end up going to other countries,” he explained. Every student who is turned away from working in America means a gain for the competition.
Chris Hansen, President of the AEA, believes that the Bush administration needs to do something to fix this problem. He says that immigration laws need to be changed “to enable high-skilled foreign talent, especially people educated in U.S universities, to stay and work in the country…and contribute to the U.S. economy.”
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