Wednesday, June 3, 2015

Where the jobs are: Pittsburgh ranks high in 'living-wage' jobs



Where has the job growth been in the Pittsburgh region over the past five years? Energy, insurance, and Web and software development have dominated the growth in good-paying jobs since 2010, according to new data from CareerBuilder.com and provided to the Pittsburgh Business Times.


CareerBuilder.com looked at the growth in jobs between 2010 and 2014 and found the Pittsburgh region was one of the 10 cities with the highest growth in so-called "living-wage jobs," positions that make enough to support a family of three, according to 2013 federal standards.

Nearly six in 10 new jobs (57.1 percent) in the region were in what paid above the cost of living, $15.59 an hour in 2013. Only seven other cities in the U.S. were ahead of Pittsburgh in the CareerBuilder.com study. No. 1 was Beaumont-Port Arthur, Texas, where the percentage was 65.9 percent above its 2013 living wage of $16.64 an hour. Only 28 metro regions had at least half of its new jobs paying a living wage, CareerBuilder.com said.

"We wanted to measure growth that is a measure of quality employment, where the new jobs can support a family," said CareerBuilder.com Senior Career Adviser Ryan Hunt.

What's surprising is that beyond such usual suspects as Silicon Valley and Seattle, the top 10 included Reading, in the eastern part of Pennsylvania; Detroit; Peoria, Ill.; Rockford, Ill.; and Albany, N.Y.

"We see a lot of Rust Belt and manufacturing heavy cities on the list," Hunt said.

The CareerBuilder.com data shows a lot of growth in energy- and insurance-related jobs, Hunt said. A lot of those are in STEM jobs that require technical training beyond high school.

"That's the sector that's really driving quality employment growth around the country," Hunt said.

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