WASHINGTON – Rhode Island’s high-tech employment dropped by 400 jobs, or 2 percent, in 2010 from 2007, according to this year’s Cyberstates report released by the TechAmerica Foundation.
The Ocean State had 19,502 high-tech jobs in 2010 at 1,882 establishments; the related payroll totals $1.4 billion and the average high-tech worker takes home $71,103.
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High-tech wages in Rhode Island are 73 percent more than the average private sector wage of $41,100. Fifty-one of every 1,000 private sector workers are employed at high-tech firms locally.
When compared to the other states, Rhode Island ranked 42nd for its high-tech employment and 25th for its average wage.
The greatest number of high-tech workers were in California, 931,040 in 2001; Texas, 456,460; and New York, 294,702. Massachusetts came in at No. 6 with 247,172 workers.
As for high-tech wages, Massachusetts ranked second to only California. Bay State workers took home as average of $107,561 while Golden State workers were slightly higher paid at $110,560.
The four industries considered high tech are:technology manufacturing, communications services, software services, and engineering and tech services.
California is the Golden State not the Sunshine State.
RI is a small state so the rank of 42 in high tech jobs gives only a partial picture. What is RI’s rank on per capita basis or what percentage of the RI workforce is in high tech and how does that compare with other states? Also what is the growth rate over the last 5 years, the last ten years? This is much more meaningful than a simple one year growth rate. EDC should be on top of this situation and must have this info at their disposal.