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Report Finds Info Tech Lost 403,000 Jobs Since Bubble Burst

September 20, 2004
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More than half since recession "officially" ended

There is little comforting news in a new statistical report for workers in the U.S. information and communication technologies (ICT) sector. Researchers from the University of Illinois-Chicago found the sector lost 403,300 jobs between March 2001 and April 2004.

A staggering 200,000 of the high-wage jobs were lost since the recession was officially declared over in November 2001, making the notion of a jobless recovery a significant understatement for the sector.

The resilience of the regional ICT sectors and the overall economies of the seven profiled metropolitan areas are being tested with the incredible losses suffered since the bubble burst in March 2001. The following list presents the percentage change in total ICT employment between March 2001 and April 2004 for the seven primary metropolitan statistical areas (PMSA):

  • San Francisco (-49.0%)
  • Boston (-34.1%)
  • San Jose (-33.1%)
  • Dallas (-30.2%)
  • Chicago (-25.9%)
  • Seattle (-10.8%)
  • Washington (-2.5%)

For the nation, a reduction of 18.8 percent of the total ICT workforce was lost during the three-year period.

America's High-Tech Bust, commissioned by the Washington Alliance of Technology Workers and funded by the Ford Foundation, is available at: http://www.washtech.org/reports/

California