Government Releases 2012-2022 Employment Forecast

The Bureau of Labor Statistics released its 2012-20 labor force forecast last week.  The below summarizes the government's expectations for the future of employment in America.

1) The government projects 15.6 million jobs will be created between 2012-2022.  This would equate to 1.56 million jobs per year, or 130,000 jobs per month.  Of course, this is without a recession.

2) The size of the labor force is expected to grow at 0.5% per year with labor force participation shrinking to 61.6 percent by 2022.

3) The government expects GDP to grow at 2.6 percent annually through this period.  Once again, no recession is expected or even mentioned.

4) Healthcare and construction are expected to be the leading industries in job creation over the next decade.


Two things that must be considered when looking at the next ten years of employment:

A) Baby boomers: While baby boomers are coming to retirement age and many are expected to retire, the concept of a second career is becoming popular amongst this generation.  This is expected to take employment opportunities away from new college graduates who have fewer skills.

B) The concept of a recession needs to be discussed, along with the probabilities of such an event.  'Recession vulnerable' occupations need to be identified along with the number of estimated job losses per X percent of GDP loss.

The entire release can be found here.