Silicon Valley is seeing a tech induced job recovery of late, with the California Employment Development Department noting that every major industry except construction added jobs in March and April 2011.
Social media firms such as Facebook, deal sites like Groupon, Internet giants like Google and local VCs are being credited with the job boon, with renewed hiring enthusiasm in the area, helping to push the valley’s job growth past California’s other top 10 metropolitan areas.
Increasing global demand for mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets is also having an effect on the job market, with many firms increasing their job openings for hardware and software engineers. According to statistics pulled from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) the valley was also the second most active area in California in terms of creating jobs in 2010, with the San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara area alone creating 14,600 jobs.
This is being reflected in salaries across the area too, with Silicon Valley posting the highest average salary in the IT industry at $99,028 per year. Approximately 30% of the valley’s private workforce is employed in the tech industry.
In February 2011, California scored its biggest one-month job gain in more than two decades, with Silicon Valley strongly pushing the region forward by adding 4,500 jobs, more than the average for that time of year. The three-county metro area of San Mateo, San Francisco and Marin counties saw a gain of 6,200 jobs in total.
Santa Clara County’s unemployment rate in February and March held steady at 10.3%, its lowest in nearly two years, down from 10.5% in January. Meanwhile, San Mateo County’s unemployment rate was 8.3% in February and 8.4% in March, down slightly from January, and remaining the third-lowest in the state.
Tech hiring in the valley was also up 1,200 jobs over the month with Google announcing it plans to add thousands of workers this year, many of them in the valley.
More industry specific numbers can be seen below:
