About 7.31 million Americans were employed in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) occupations in 2018, an increase of 7.48% from 2014, when there were 6.80 million STEM workers. Those who are interested in joining this growing industry may have further opportunities to find jobs and save enough, as the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) expects an uptick in most STEM occupations over the next decade. According to BLS predictions, there will be 8.05 million STEM workers in 2028.
Though most STEM jobs have grown over the past years and are expected to continue that upward trend, some specific occupations have gained more ground than others. In this study, we looked at the changing landscape of STEM and uncovered the fastest-growing STEM jobs in the U.S. For details on our data sources or how we put the information together to create our findings, check out the Data and Methodology section below.
Key Findings
- Overall growth in the STEM field is slowing. Over the past four years, the number of STEM jobs in the U.S. increased by 7.48%, or an annualized rate of 1.45%. Over the coming 10 years, the BLS expects STEM jobs to increase by 10.13%, or a rate of only 1.01% every year.
- STEM jobs are shifting toward those with a computer and mathematical focus. In 2014, 53.23% of STEM jobs fell under the category of computer and mathematical occupations. That percentage grew over the four years since and is expected to continue to grow. In 2018, 54.75% of STEM jobs had a computer and mathematical focus, and the BLS predicts that this percentage will increase to 56.56% by 2028.
- Large STEM occupations can expect continued growth. Many of the occupations that rank in our list of the top 25 fastest-growing STEM jobs are already fairly large. In particular, the four largest STEM jobs in 2018 – applications software developers, computer user support specialists, computer systems analysts and systems software developers – all rank in the 10 fastest-growing STEM jobs. In 2018, each of these four occupations employed more than 400,000 workers each