Economic Prosperity:

Technology Sector Employment & Wages

Key message

Oregon has a well-established technology sector, which commercializes new ideas and generates high wage jobs. It is becoming evident that all companies are dependent on technological innovation to compete in the global economy. Thus, it is important to maintain the state's leadership in technology generating industries.

Why is it significant?

Technology sector industries—as defined by the 2008 New Economy Index—are an important part of an economy because they account for a significant share of new invention applications in a broad set of industries. States with a critical mass of jobs in technology generating industries tend to attract other businesses and workers with a high degree of inventiveness, and help to increase the competitiveness of all traded sector industries.

How does Oregon perform?

Oregon's technology sector is comprised of approximately 92,000 manufacturing and service jobs that account for about 6.4 percent of Oregon's private sector employment. Oregon's technology sector employment is volatile. Sector employment was hard hit by the economic recession in 2001, outpaced the nation during the subsequent expansion from 2004 to 2006, and fell faster than the national average during the economic recession of 2008. See Figure 20.

Oregon's technology sector is larger than the nation's when measured as a percentage of private employment. Among competitor states, Oregon ranks in the middle of the pack and behind many of our neighboring states. See Figure 21.

Average wages in the technology sector pay twice a much as the average private sector job. In 2008, technology sector wages were approximately $80,000 per year compared to an average private sector wage of about $40,000. See Figure 22.

Figure 21. 2008 Technology Sector Employment

State	Rank	Technology Sector Employment	Private Sector Employment	% Private Sector Employment
Colorado	3	175,671	1,943,280	9.0%
California	5	1,087,738	13,042,134	8.3%
Washington	8	195,085	2,429,884	8.0%
Utah	10	72,218	1,021,933	7.1%
Oregon	12	92,255	1,437,750	6.4%
Minnesota	13	147,062	2,303,642	6.4%
Idaho	14	33,987	539,626	6.3%
Arizona	17	124,801	2,174,709	5.7%
New York	25	359,362	7,162,962	5.0%
United States		6,865,021	113,192,473	6.1%

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics, QCEW; Technology sector defined by 2008 New State Economy Index