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Not All Growth is Created Equal: Occupation-level Trends in Texas

ByBlake Decker

In our first post of this new series, we saw that Texas is forecasted to have the highest number of jobs added to its economy by 2034 when compared to other states in America. The 2.8-million job increase from the actual 13.9 million jobs in 2022 to the predicted 16.8 million jobs in 2034 places Texas third nationally in terms of percentage increase at 20.3%. We will begin drilling-down into more granular levels of data in this blog post by exploring the occupations where Texas is predicted to see the highest levels of numerical and percentage growth in the next decade.

Disaggregating Texas Jobs Growth through 2034

Using data from Lightcast, a labor market analytics company, the visualizations below provide data on the 23 major occupation groups that are tracked by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). These domains, which are aggregated at the 2-digit SOC (Standard Occupational Classification) level, represent almost 800 total occupations that have a 5-digit SOC designation that are tracked by the BLS and Lightcast. 

Numeric Increase

  • When looking at the job increases projected for Texas, the top 5 occupation groups below account for more than 45% of the overall growth of more than 2.8-million jobs for the state of Texas. Although located in the middle of the growth distribution, the “Office and Administrative Support” group carries the mantle of highest number of jobs overall in 2022 (1.84M) and in 2034 (1.98M), which represents a 142K, or 8%, increase. 
  • The occupation group with the highest predicted numeric growth is the “Management” group, which is forecasted to increase by almost 320,000 jobs by 2034 (1.1M in 2022 to 1.42M in 2034). At the 5-digit SOC level within the Management group, “General and Operations Managers” account for more than 95,000 jobs of the predicted increase by 2034. “Financial Managers” (28,452) and “Computer and Information Systems Managers” (27,757) are the other occupations in the Management group with increases exceeding 25K. 
  • While “Food Preparation and Serving Related” occupations are fourth in terms of growth at 242,222, the “Fast Food and Counter Workers” group is the overall highest growth occupation group at the 5-digit SOC level with more than 99K new jobs created in the next decade, increasing from 352,111 in 2022 to 451,542 in 2034, a 28% increase.
  • The second-highest growth occupation group is “Transportation and Material Moving” with almost 260K new jobs in 2034. Within this group, “Stockers and Order Fillers” (61.2K), “Laborers and Freight, and Material Movers, Hand” (51.5K), and “Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers” (39.3K) make up almost 60% of the growth in this occupation group.
NOTE: Hover over each bar for additional information related to job growth in each occupation group.

Percentage Increase

  • In the second data tab above, we can see that the statewide “Overall” average for occupation growth is 20.3%. There are 14 occupation groups that are higher than the overall percentage increase in the state of Texas. Nine occupation groups, including “Educational Instruction and Library” (e.g., elementary, secondary, and postsecondary teachers, librarians, and instructional specialists) and “Protective Service” (e.g., law enforcement, firefighters, detectives and investigators), are below the state-wide average for percentage increase.
  • “Computer and Mathematical Occupations” is the group with the highest percentage increase of 41.9% from 480,668 in 2022 to 682,012 in 2034. At the 5-digit SOC level in this occupation group, “Software Developers” have the highest numeric increase of 84,294 (127,104 in 2022 to 211,398 in 2034) for a 66% increase. “Data Scientists” is the occupation within this group that has the highest percentage increase of 82% from 16,961 in 2022 to 30,937 in 2034. 
  •  “Business and Financial Operations” trails the “Computer and Mathematical” occupations group by 12.6 percentage at 29.3% growth from 2022 (841K) to 2034 (1.1M). Within this occupation group, “Accountants and Auditors” comprise the highest number of jobs in 2022 (114K) and 2034 (145K), representing a 31K (or 27%) increase. “Project Management Specialists” have the highest numeric increase of 38,135 (or 37%) from 2022 (104,061) to 2034 (142,196), while “Management Analysts” have the highest percentage increase of 56% from 46K in 2022 to 72K in 2034.
  • Across the almost 800 occupations in Texas, there are 40 occupations predicted to have more than 100,000 jobs total in 2034. Out of this group, the “Fast Food and Counter Workers” group has the highest numeric job increase at 99,431, while the “Software Developers” group has the highest percentage gain in jobs at 66%. 

So What?

The first two blog posts in this series have served to provide a general overview of job growth projections in the state of Texas for the next decade. While these insights fall in the “nice to know” category, the benefit of these data are in terms of understanding how higher education institutions and systems, as well as policymakers, need to respond to these projections. 

For example, in the first visualization above, we see that the “Healthcare Practitioners and Technical” occupations group is projected to have the 5th-highest numerical increase with 204,578 new jobs created by 2034. Within this occupation group are “Registered Nurses” that are projected to increase by almost 62,000 jobs from 2022 to 2034, while “Nurse Practitioners” jobs are projected to increase by over 78% by 2034. With those projections in mind, the next questions for higher education leaders are: “Where are we now in terms of preparing registered nurses and nurse practitioners?”, and “How do we ensure our academic programs are keeping pace with future demand?” These are the types of questions we will strive to answer, at least in part, in the remaining posts in this blog series.