Economic Impact and Workforce Analysis
Aerospace Works for Washington (AWW) is a statewide coalition of elected officials, business and community leaders working to ensure Washington State remains a leader in aerospace. To develop effective strategies and communicate with stakeholders, AWW commissioned CAI to develop a model of workforce supply and demand, and to assess the economic impact of the sector.
If you have questions about this report, or would like to learn more about CAI’s talent pipeline model, and approach to economic impact and workforce analysis, please get in touch at 206-523-6683 or by email to info@communityattributes.com
Aerospace Workforce Supply and Demand
Across the Washington state aerospace industry, more than 62,300 employees work in 56 core aerospace industry occupations. These core occupations represent only a portion of total employment within the aerospace industry. Overall employment within the aerospace industry includes employment in other occupations that are commonly found in other industries, as well. Core aerospace industry occupation employment is projected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 0.8% between 2021 and 2026. In total, annual openings in core aerospace industry occupations are projected to total more than 6,000 per year between 2021 and 2026. Annual openings include new jobs created due to growth as well as job openings created by existing employees exiting employment to retire, move or change occupations.
Annual openings are those openings that are projected to be filled annually and do not account for job openings that go unfilled. In 2018, across Washington, there were an average of more than 150,500 job postings per month, according to Help Wanted Online data from The Conference Board. Key aerospace occupation groups had thousands of job postings monthly. Engineering occupations averaged nearly 3,900 job postings per month. Production occupations, including supervisors, assemblers and fabricators, and metal and plastic workers had an average of nearly 2,000 job postings per month.
The Aerospace Workforce Supply and Demand Dashboard presented below shows occupations in the aerospace industry grouped by minimum education level required for entry and ranked by average annual openings within the industry from 2021 to 2026. In some cases, the actual education required by Washington state employers may be different from the minimum education level categories defined by the Bureau of Labor Statistics
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