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Employment to grow 7.7 percent from 2020 to 2030; 1.7 percent excluding COVID-19 recovery
September 23, 2021
Total U.S. employment is projected to grow from 153.5 million to 165.4 million from 2020 to 2030, an increase of 11.9 million jobs, or 7.7 percent. Excluding a projected increase of 9.3 million jobs attributed to the COVID–19 recovery from low base-year employment for 2020 and its associated recession, employment is projected to increase by 1.7 percent.
Projected percent change in employment by major occupational group, 2020–2030, including adjustments for pandemic recovery
Major occupation group
Percent change in employment
Percent change in employment, excluding pandemic recovery
Healthcare support
23.1%
20.5%
Personal care and service
21.7
0.0
Food preparation and serving related
19.6
0.5
Computer and mathematical
14.1
14.1
Arts, design, entertainment, sports, and media
13.1
3.3
Community and social service
12.4
12.4
Healthcare practitioners and technical
10.8
9.5
Educational instruction and library
10.1
3.4
Management
9.3
0.0
Legal
8.8
8.3
Transportation and material moving
8.8
5.2
Protective service
8.4
2.6
Business and financial operations
8.0
8.0
Life, physical, and social science
7.9
6.8
Total, all occupations
7.7
1.7
Building and grounds cleaning and maintenance
7.5
0.0
Installation, maintenance, and repair
6.7
1.9
Construction and extraction
5.7
0.3
Architecture and engineering
5.6
0.8
Farming, fishing, and forestry
2.5
0.0
Production
-0.4
-0.4
Sales and related
-1.4
-1.4
Office and administrative support
-2.8
-2.8
Healthcare support occupations are projected for the fastest employment growth among all occupational groups. Personal care and service occupations and food preparation and serving related occupations are also projected for rapid employment growth, mainly due to recovery growth following low 2020 base-year employment.
Computer and mathematical occupations are expected to see fast employment growth as strong demand is expected for IT security and software development, in part due to increased telework spurred by COVID-19. Demand for new products associated with the Internet of Things (IoT), and for analyzing large datasets is also expected to contribute to fast employment growth for these occupations, which include statisticians, information security analysts, and data scientists.
Several of the fastest growing healthcare occupations, including nurse practitioners, physical therapist assistants, and physician assistants, are projected to see strong demand as team-based healthcare models are increasingly used to deliver healthcare services.
Fastest growing and declining occupations, projected 2020 to 2030
Occupation
Percent change in employment
Wind turbine service technicians
68.2%
Nurse practitioners
52.2
Solar photovoltaic installers
52.1
Statisticians
35.4
Physical therapist assistants
35.4
Information security analysts
33.3
Home health and personal care aides
32.6
Medical and health services managers
32.5
Data scientists and mathematical science occupations, all other
31.4
Physician assistants
31.0
Epidemiologists
29.6
Logisticians
29.5
Speech-language pathologists
28.7
Animal trainers
28.5
Computer numerically controlled tool programmers
27.4
Telemarketers
-18.3
Manufactured building and mobile home installers
-18.4
Executive secretaries and executive administrative assistants
-18.7
Floral designers
-20.1
Legal secretaries and administrative assistants
-21.0
Shoe machine operators and tenders
-21.6
Data entry keyers
-22.5
Switchboard operators, including answering service
-22.7
Door-to-door sales workers, news and street vendors, and related workers
-24.1
Watch and clock repairers
-24.9
Telephone operators
-25.4
Cutters and trimmers, hand
-29.7
Nuclear power reactor operators
-32.9
Parking enforcement workers
-35.0
Word processors and typists
-36.0
Note: Fastest growing occupations exclude occupations with above average cyclical recovery.
Technological changes facilitating increased automation are expected to result in declining employment for office and administrative support occupations, such as word processors and typists; legal secretaries and administrative assistants; and executive secretaries and executive administrative assistants.
These data are from the BLS Employment Projections program. Pandemic recovery represents the reversal of declines in employment between 2019 and 2020, for occupational groups that experienced declines during that period and that are projected to grow between 2020 and 2030. Additional information about these and many other occupations may be found in the Occupational Outlook Handbook or "Employment Projections — 2020–2030."
United States Department of Labor
