Software and data-related hiring remain strong despite otherwise flat IT sector

Coming off its best hiring month in July, the U.S. information technology sector was unable to maintain that positive momentum in August, and overall hiring is now essentially flat.

But two areas that continue to show healthy growth are in custom software development and data-related jobs such as data processing, hosting and related services.

In its recent Employment Situation report, industry association CompTIA reviewed the August hiring numbers from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and confirmed that overall hiring in IT is now flat over the previous hiring period, as the tech sector shed 400 jobs.

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Team of IT specialists in datacenter working by network servers

Where hiring gains were reported was in custom software development, IT services and computer system design (with 3,900 new jobs added); search portals (800 jobs added); and data processing, hosting and related services (700 jobs added).

Job losses were reported in the areas of telecommunications (down 4,000 jobs); and computer, electronics and semiconductor manufacturing (down 1,800 jobs).

“Tech manufacturing’s run of 14 consecutive months of job gains came to end,” said Tim Herbert, senior vice president for research and market intelligence at CompTIA. “While it is difficult to pinpoint the exact cause of a downturn in any given month, the escalating disruption to international trade is certainly weighing on the minds of industry executives.”

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