WASHINGTON – High-tech wages in Rhode Island plunged by more than 10 percent in 2007, reversing a big increase posted in 2006, according to the 12th annual Cyberstates report released today in Washington, D.C.
The average high-tech worker in Rhode Island earned $69,522 in 2007, down 10.1 percent from the state’s average high-tech wage of $77,376 in 2006. Over the same period, the total payroll of high-tech businesses in Rhode Island fell by $163 million, or 10.9 percent, to $1.3 billion, the study found.
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The annual report – published by TechAmerica, the high-tech trade association formed by the Feb. 10 merger of the American Electronics Association (AeA), Electronic Components Association (ECA), Government Electronics & Information Association (GEIA) and Information Technology Association of America (ITAA) – is based on data from the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
Rhode Island was the only state that saw double-digit drops in its high-tech wages in 2007, the latest year for which state data are available from the BLS. Vermont had the second-sharpest decline in its average high-tech wage, although its 3.7 percent decline was 6.4 percentage points less steep than Rhode Island’s. Idaho saw the second-sharpest fall in total high-tech payroll, with a drop of 8.6 percent, or 2.2 percentage points less than Rhode Island’s decline.
But the Ocean State’s 2007 statistics suffered by comparison with the year before, when high-tech wages appear to have experienced a brief spike. (READ MORE) Experts commenting to PBN on the new figures acknowledged that the 2006 numbers may have been a statistical blip.
The wage declines came as Rhode Island’s economy fell into a deep recession from which it has yet to emerge.
The national economy entered a recession in December 2007, but economists say the downturn began earlier in the Ocean State. Rhode Island’s unemployment rate – after averaging 5 percent in 2007, and 7.8 percent last year – stood at 10.5 percent in February.
The high-tech industry employed 19,168 people in Rhode Island in 2007, a slight decrease from 2006, when the study found 164 more high-tech workers in the state. But the state did add 600 high-tech jobs from 2002 to 2007, an increase of 3 percent.
Rhode Island continued to rank 42nd in the nation for its total number of high-tech workers, the same position it has held since 2004. And 46 of every 1,000 private-sector workers statewide were employed by high-tech firms in 2007, the same as the year before.
Meanwhile, Massachusetts added 3,800 high-tech jobs in 2007, an increase of 2 percent, the study found. And the Bay State’s average high-tech wage that year was $100,500, the second-highest in the nation.
Nationwide, the report found the high-tech industry added 77,000 net jobs in 2008, in its fourth consecutive annual increase, for a total of 5.9 million workers. The industry lost 38,000 jobs in the fourth quarter, however, amid a sharp slowdown in the broader economy.
“The U.S. high-tech industry continued to add jobs in 2008. However, future growth is clearly jeopardized as a result of the current economic downturn and the volatility of global financial markets,” TechAmerica CEO Christopher W. Hansen, who also had been president and CEO of the AeA, said in a statement.
Still, he added, “while we suffered losses in the fourth quarter, our industry has weathered the storm better than most, and the results of our report indicate that the tech industry is well-positioned to help lead America’s economic recovery.”
Additional information about “Cyberstates 2009: A Complete State-by-State Overview of the High-Technology Industry” will appear in the April 6-12 edition of Providence Business News.
TechAmerica is a trade group for the electronics and IT sectors. The industry’s largest advocacy organization, representing about 1,500 member companies of all sizes, it has offices in Washington, D.C.; Brussels; and Beijing. Additional information is available at www.TechAmerica.org.
