Design Services Industry Employment Tops 1.6 Million for the First Time

Industry News / Industry Statistics

March 17, 2022

Design Services Industry Employment Tops 1.6 Million for the First Time

With the remarkable expansion of the design services industry over the past 18 months, employment in the sector topped 1.6 million in February, up by nearly 9 percent since April 2020.

Employment in the industry had been climbing steadily for several years, but the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic caused an instantaneous crash, with employee totals falling 4.5 percent in one April, 2020.

Immediately after that decline, however, employment began climbing again, and it has increased month-over-month in 20 of the past 22 months.

One impact of this rapid and sustained rise in employment has been the further tightening of an already difficult labor market for engineers. According to the latest unemployment report, the Professional Services sector, which includes Design Services, has an unemployment rate of just 2.2 percent, compared to the national unemployment rate of 3.8 percent.

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