September 2024 Jobs Report
Methodology
To present the insights in this report, Dice used job posting data provided by Dice’s partner, Lightcast, which has a database of more than 1 billion current and historical job postings worldwide. Dice pulled data on September 16, 2024 and analyzed over 7 million tech job postings in the U.S. to gather our specific dataset, which we then filtered for “Information Technology” jobs that fall under “Full Time,” “Part Time” and “Flexible Hours.” We gathered the list of top employers in the “Industry Analysis” section by using the above criteria, with an additional filter for job postings that only derive from employer sites. The information in this report is a snapshot of tech job posting data as of September 16, 2024, and backward revisions to prior month’s data may occur from the sources used in this report.
How are Tech Jobs Faring in the Hiring Market?
The tech job market saw its share of job postings increase by 11% in August compared to July, adding over 23,000 jobs to the market. While August 2024’s number of job postings is still slightly smaller than last year, it is encouraging to see some growth over July. Consistent with recent trends, the tech unemployment rate also rose in August, reaching 3.4%. While a rising unemployment rate is unusual for the tech sector, it remains below the overall national unemployment rate of 4.2%.
Optimism for a healing tech job market is rising as we move into September, boosted by hope for a September surge of hiring alongside the Federal Reserve's decision to lower interest rates by half a percentage point on September 18th. HR professionals are generally optimistic as well. According to our 2024 Tech Sentiment Report, 70% of HR professionals expect tech hiring to increase for the remainder of 2024.
Where are Tech Job Postings Concentrated?
The states with the most tech hiring in August were California, Texas, Virginia, and New York — typical hotspots for tech jobs. These states have consistently led in the tech hiring scene throughout 2024. California accounted for 11% of the total tech job postings in August. In terms of growth, New York, Georgia, Washington, Texas, and California saw the largest gains, with New York showing the most month over month growth at 21%. Compared to August last year, Washington experienced a notable jump, with a 49% increase compared to August 2023. With an eye on recent return to work announcements at Amazon, one of Washington’s most prominent tech workplaces, this jump is hardly surprising.
Once again, the industry that added the most jobs in August was consulting, showing a staggering 45% month over month gain, followed by software, retail, finance, aerospace, and technology. It was education, however, that saw the highest month-over-month growth, rising 85% in August. When compared to August 2023, government sector job postings experienced a remarkable 264% growth. Retail, software, and manufacturing sectors also showed significant increases compared to August last year.
Who Are Companies Hiring Right Now?
In terms of technical skills, the top month over month gains in August were in computer science, operations, troubleshooting, Python and Agile Methodology. Soft skills such as communication, management, problem-solving, and leadership remain consistently highlighted in job postings. Compared to July, collaborative software, COBOL, product roadmaps, sprints, retrospectives, and analytical techniques saw the most growth, each increasing by over 50%.
Job posting mentions of the skill Generative AI increased quite a bit year over year, at 381%. Mentions of Building Codes, GDPR, Deep Learning, and Neuro Language Processing (NLP) fill out the remaining top five for year over year skill growth.