Growth in tourism industry part of larger trend toward service-sector jobs
- May 25, 2015
- / Rick Harper
- / economy
Memorial Day kicks off our summer tourism season. Tourism looks healthy and is an engine that pulls along employment – particularly in leisure and hospitality, and in wholesale and retail trade, but also in other sectors. It is the biggest contributor to the 7,300 job growth in the two-county metro area that as occurred since March 2013.
Over the last generation, we have typically added jobs at about the same rate at the nation. Our job growth totals over the last two years have been much better than that, and those new jobs appear to be sustainable.
The growth in tourism-driven activity is part of a longer running shift in the local and national economy into service sector jobs.
Pensacola’s traditional manufacturing and government jobs have been shrinking as a share of total employment. Taken together, manufacturing and government jobs accounted for in every three jobs in 1990. Today, that share has shrunk to about one in five.
In contrast, jobs in education, health care services, leisure and hospitality and professional and business services accounted for 27 percent of jobs back in 1990. In 2014, those sectors accounted for 43 percent, or over two in five nonfarm jobs in the two counties.
Looking forward, that trend is likely to continue. The top five projected job growth occupations between now and 2020 for our two-county area are customer service representatives, retail salespersons, nursing assistants, food preparation/servers, and janitors/cleaners.
In manufacturing, keeping an expensive factory running requires skilled workers doing specific tasks that keep the process flowing. The military has found that pay levels have to be relatively high to attract the personnel willing to undertake that commitment. The challenge is that many of the new service economy jobs don’t carry the same wage rate as the jobs that we have lost.
Higher-wage sectors that are growing, such as information technology and information services, simply aren’t yet large enough in our local economy to be the basis for widespread growth in living standards. New technologies and applications developed in the labs of Fortune 500 companies and in startup firms in hotbeds around the nation may replace jobs that provided paychecks locally.
Job growth is occurring as more visitors choose to enjoy what our region has to offer. We have to work to make sure that these choices create more than just lower wage service jobs, but instead translate into opportunity to get ahead. The same amenities that visitors enjoy are attractive to firms and their skilled workers.
The growth momentum seems more sustainable than it has in the past. This is due in no small part to hiring commitments by area firms such as Navy Federal, and also to a recovery in health care jobs in recent months. However, there are continuing downside risks, such as military payroll in an era of federal spending restraint.
We don’t have any way of knowing exactly which of today’s entrepreneurs have the right stuff to succeed. But excellent career training and higher education options are necessary to provide technical and advanced training for the workforce that will staff growing high-wage firms. An attractive and walkable urban core with cultural amenities, and affordable and accessible suburbs, along with safe streets and good schools, will reinforce and sustain the jobs momentum.
Dr. Rick Harper serves as director of the Studer Community Institute, a Pensacola, Florida-based organization that seeks citizen-powered solutions to challenges the community faces. He also directs the University of West Florida’s Office of Economic Development and Engagement in Pensacola.
The growth in tourism-driven activity is part of a longer running shift in the local and national economy into service sector jobs.
Pensacola’s traditional manufacturing and government jobs have been shrinking as a share of total employment. Taken together, manufacturing and government jobs accounted for in every three jobs in 1990. Today, that share has shrunk to about one in five.
In contrast, jobs in education, health care services, leisure and hospitality and professional and business services accounted for 27 percent of jobs back in 1990. In 2014, those sectors accounted for 43 percent, or over two in five nonfarm jobs in the two counties.
Looking forward, that trend is likely to continue. The top five projected job growth occupations between now and 2020 for our two-county area are customer service representatives, retail salespersons, nursing assistants, food preparation/servers, and janitors/cleaners.
In manufacturing, keeping an expensive factory running requires skilled workers doing specific tasks that keep the process flowing. The military has found that pay levels have to be relatively high to attract the personnel willing to undertake that commitment. The challenge is that many of the new service economy jobs don’t carry the same wage rate as the jobs that we have lost.
Higher-wage sectors that are growing, such as information technology and information services, simply aren’t yet large enough in our local economy to be the basis for widespread growth in living standards. New technologies and applications developed in the labs of Fortune 500 companies and in startup firms in hotbeds around the nation may replace jobs that provided paychecks locally.
Job growth is occurring as more visitors choose to enjoy what our region has to offer. We have to work to make sure that these choices create more than just lower wage service jobs, but instead translate into opportunity to get ahead. The same amenities that visitors enjoy are attractive to firms and their skilled workers.
The growth momentum seems more sustainable than it has in the past. This is due in no small part to hiring commitments by area firms such as Navy Federal, and also to a recovery in health care jobs in recent months. However, there are continuing downside risks, such as military payroll in an era of federal spending restraint.
We don’t have any way of knowing exactly which of today’s entrepreneurs have the right stuff to succeed. But excellent career training and higher education options are necessary to provide technical and advanced training for the workforce that will staff growing high-wage firms. An attractive and walkable urban core with cultural amenities, and affordable and accessible suburbs, along with safe streets and good schools, will reinforce and sustain the jobs momentum.
Dr. Rick Harper serves as director of the Studer Community Institute, a Pensacola, Florida-based organization that seeks citizen-powered solutions to challenges the community faces. He also directs the University of West Florida’s Office of Economic Development and Engagement in Pensacola.
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