For release 10:00 a.m. (EDT) Tuesday, March 27, 2012 USDL-12-0548
Technical information: (202) 691-6569 * oesinfo@bls.gov * www.bls.gov/oes
Media contact: (202) 691-5902 * PressOffice@bls.gov
OCCUPATIONAL EMPLOYMENT AND WAGES -- MAY 2011
Retail salespersons and cashiers were the occupations with the highest
employment in 2011, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today.
These two occupations combined made up nearly 6 percent of total U.S.
employment, with employment levels of 4.3 and 3.3 million, respectively.
National employment and wage information for all occupations is shown in
table 1.
These data are from the Occupational Employment Statistics (OES) program,
which provides employment and wage estimates by area and by industry for
wage and salary workers in 22 major occupational groups and nearly 800
detailed occupations.
Occupations
--The 10 largest occupations accounted for more than 20 percent of
total employment in May 2011. In addition to retail salespersons and
cashiers, the largest occupations included general office clerks;
combined food preparation and serving workers, including fast food;
registered nurses; waiters and waitresses; and customer service
representatives.
--Most of the largest occupations were relatively low paying. Of the
10 largest occupations, only registered nurses, with an annual
mean wage of $69,110, had an average wage above the U.S. all-
occupations mean of $21.74 per hour or $45,230 annually. Annual mean
wages for the rest of the 10 largest occupations ranged from $18,790
for combined food preparation and serving workers to $33,120 for
customer service representatives.
--Office and administrative support was the largest occupational group,
making up nearly 17 percent of total U.S. employment. The next
largest groups were sales and related occupations and food preparation
and serving related occupations, which made up about 11 and 9 percent
of U.S. employment, respectively. Seven of the 10 largest occupations
were in one of these three groups. The smallest occupational groups
included legal occupations and life, physical, and social science
occupations, each making up less than 1 percent of total employment.
--The highest paying occupational groups were management, legal,
computer and mathematical, and architecture and engineering
occupations. Most individual occupations in these groups were also
high paying. For example, of the 35 architecture and engineering
occupations, only one--surveying and mapping technicians, with an
annual mean wage of $42,050--had an average wage below the U.S. all-
occupations mean. (See table 1.)
--The lowest paying occupational groups were food preparation and
serving related; farming, fishing, and forestry; personal care
and service; and building and grounds cleaning and maintenance
occupations. Annual mean wages for these groups ranged from $21,430
for food preparation and serving related occupations to $25,560 for
building and grounds cleaning and maintenance occupations. Nearly all
of the individual occupations in these groups had below-average wages.
For example, chefs and head cooks was the only food preparation and
serving related occupation with a mean wage above the U.S. all-
occupations mean, and 15 of the 18 occupations in this group had
annual mean wages of $25,000 or less. (See table 1.)
Occupational profiles for all occupations are available on the BLS website
at www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_stru.htm.
Ownership
--Eight of the 10 largest occupations in the private sector were the
same as those in the economy as a whole; stock clerks and order fillers and
general and operations managers rounded out the largest private sector
occupations. Among the 10 largest occupations overall, over 91 percent
of employment was in the private sector, with the share of private sector
employment ranging from 75 percent of janitors and secretaries to nearly
100 percent of retail salespersons and waiters and waitresses.
--Five of the 10 largest occupations in the public sector were
education related: elementary, middle, and secondary school teachers,
except special education; teacher assistants; and teachers and
instructors, all other. Seventy percent or more of total employment
and over 90 percent of public sector employment in each of these 5
occupations was in local government. Other large occupations in local
government included police and sheriff’s patrol officers, janitors,
general office clerks, and firefighters.
--Correctional officers and jailers and general office clerks were the
largest occupations in state government, with employment of nearly
250,000 and 190,000, respectively. Additional large occupations in
state government included registered nurses, graduate teaching
assistants, postsecondary health specialties teachers, and police and
sheriff's patrol officers.
--Three of the 10 largest occupations in the federal government
were specific to the U.S. Postal Service: postal service mail
carriers, with employment of 315,320; postal service mail sorters,
processors, and processing machine operators (139,680); and postal
service clerks (64,710). The largest federal government occupations
also included registered nurses, management analysts, and compliance
officers.
OES data by ownership are available on the BLS website at
www.bls.gov/oes/current/oessrci.htm.
Industry
--Health care and social assistance was the industry sector with the
highest employment. Over half of May 2011 employment in the health
care and social assistance sector was in healthcare-related
occupations. Registered nurses was the largest occupation in this
sector, with nearly 2.4 million jobs, almost 70 percent of which were
in hospitals. Other large healthcare occupations in this sector were
nursing aides, orderlies, and attendants; home health aides; licensed
practical and licensed vocational nurses; and medical assistants.
Outside of the healthcare occupational groups, the largest occupations
in this sector were personal care aides, childcare workers, and three
office and administrative support occupations: medical secretaries,
receptionists and information clerks, and general office clerks.
--Other large industry sectors included retail trade, educational
services, and manufacturing. More than 60 percent of retail trade
employment was in just 4 occupations: retail salespersons, cashiers,
stock clerks and order fillers, and first-line supervisors of retail
sales workers. Education, training, and library occupations made up
about 59 percent of employment in the educational services sector,
including 5 of the 10 largest occupations; the largest occupation
outside of the education group was janitors and cleaners, except maids
and housekeeping cleaners. About half of manufacturing employment was
in production occupations, including team assemblers, with employment
of 703,740; first-line supervisors of production and operating workers
(406,820); and machinists (294,620).
--Industries with the highest all-occupations mean wages included
computer and peripheral equipment manufacturing, software publishers,
oil and gas extraction, and several financial services industries.
These industries tended to have high employment concentrations of
occupations with high wages, and in some cases, above average wages
for individual occupations. For example, the largest occupations in
oil and gas extraction included petroleum engineers, with an annual
mean wage of $150,890; geoscientists, except hydrologists and
geographers ($139,390); and accountants and auditors ($75,720); these
three occupations also had higher wages in oil and gas extraction than
in all industries combined.
--Industries with the lowest all-occupations mean wages included
support activities for crop production and several retail trade and
food service industries. In limited-service eating places, the
industry with the lowest overall average wage, 7 of the 10 largest
occupations had mean wages below $20,000 per year. Cashiers, with an
annual mean wage of $18,830, made up 65 percent of employment in
gasoline stations; other large occupations in this industry included
first-line supervisors of retail sales workers ($34,380); combined
food preparation and serving workers, including fast food ($18,800);
and automotive and watercraft service attendants ($20,380).
OES national industry-specific data are available on the BLS website at
www.bls.gov/oes/current/oessrci.htm.
State and Local Area
--States with high total employment, such as California, Texas, New
York, and Florida, also tended to have the highest employment of many
individual occupations. For example, California and Texas had the
highest employment of surveyors, with employment levels of 4,480 and
4,210, respectively. However, smaller states often had higher-than-
average employment concentrations of particular occupations. For
instance, as a share of total employment, Alaska and Wyoming had more
than 3 times as many surveyors as the U.S. as a whole.
--Similarly, large metropolitan areas tended to have the highest
number of jobs in many individual occupations, but smaller
metropolitan areas often had high concentrations of specific
occupations. For example, Chicago-Joliet-Naperville, Ill.-Ind.-Wis.,
and Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana, Calif., had the highest
employment of team assemblers, although neither area had a
particularly high employment share of this occupation. However,
Elkhart-Goshen, Ind., had an employment share of team assemblers
nearly 10 times the U.S. average, and Spartanburg, S.C., and
Lafayette, Ind., had employment shares nearly 7 times the average for
this occupation.
--Wages for a given occupation also varied considerably across
areas. For example, annual mean wages for applications software
developers ranged from $64,000 in North Dakota and $64,720 in Wyoming
to $99,800 in Virginia and $104,450 in California. Wages for this
occupation varied even more by area than by state: among metropolitan
areas with at least 100 applications software developers, annual mean
wages ranged from $49,530 in Myrtle Beach-North Myrtle Beach-Conway,
S.C., and $56,780 in Deltona-Daytona Beach-Ormond Beach, Fla., to
$117,150 in San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, Calif., and $129,480 in
the Haverhill-North Andover-Andover, Mass., NECTA division.
OES data, including location quotients, by state and
metropolitan/nonmetropolitan area are available on the BLS website at
www.bls.gov/oes/current/oessrcst.htm and www.bls.gov/oes/current/oessrcma.htm, respectively.
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| |
| Notes on the Occupational Employment Statistics Data |
| |
| The Occupational Employment Statistics (OES) program provides |
| employment and wage estimates for wage and salary workers in 22 |
| major occupational groups and nearly 800 detailed occupations. |
| OES produces cross-industry occupational employment and wage |
| data for the nation, states, metropolitan areas, metropolitan |
| divisions, and nonmetropolitan areas; industry-specific data for |
| the nation; and data by ownership across all industries and for |
| schools and hospitals. |
| |
| The May 2011 OES estimates are based in part on data collected |
| using the 2010 Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) system |
| and in part on data collected using the 2000 SOC system. Nearly |
| all the occupations in this release are 2010 SOC occupations; |
| however, some are not. In these cases, an estimate for a hybrid |
| OES-specific occupation was created from data reported for one |
| or more occupations in the 2000 SOC combined with data reported |
| for one or more 2010 SOC occupations. Some occupations have the |
| same title as a 2010 SOC occupation, but not the same content. |
| These occupations are marked with an asterisk (*) and given a |
| temporary code for the OES data. The May 2012 OES data will |
| reflect the full set of detailed occupations in the 2010 SOC. |
| For a list of all occupations, including 2010 SOC occupations, |
| and information on how data collected using two structures were |
| combined, see the OES Frequently Asked Questions online at |
| www.bls.gov/oes/oes_ques.htm#Ques41. |
| |
| The May 2011 OES estimates are the last to be produced using the |
| 2007 North American Industry Classification System (NAICS). The |
| May 2012 estimates will be based on the 2012 NAICS. |
| |
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