The Seattle area job market appeared to improve over the last quarter, with the unemployment rate declining and job openings increasing slightly. But those averages obscure a significant restructuring that may reshape the regional labor force.
Job growth is shifting away from the tech industry — once seen as the unstoppable economic engine of the region — toward healthcare and frontline services. That’s according to new data compiled by the Workforce Development Council (WDC) of Seattle-King County, a nonprofit that helps set employment strategy for the region.
Job openings for truck drivers, for example, spiked 231% over the past month. Security guard openings saw a 146% jump. Meanwhile, listings for tech and science jobs declined over the same time period. Openings for software engineers saw the steepest drop of 56%.
“It’s just been a drastic change from the early part of the year,” said Jeremy Warren, director of impact at WDC. “Before, software developer postings and engineering postings were still pretty high in our index, but now you can see that they’re decreasing double digits over the last 30 days and even 60 days, where we’re seeing a lot of this decrease in the information sector.”…