SJ County sees strong tech/info sector job growth

By Reed Fujii

Record Staff Writer

Posted Jul. 14, 2015

The Silicon Valley and San Francisco have long been identified as thriving growth centers for technology and information industries.

But a study released Tuesday said that the impact is spreading well beyond those hot spots to “a wide range of metro areas around the state,” including San Joaquin County.

The Progressive Policy Institute said that the county saw a 16 percent gain in tech/info employment since 2011, when the sector began its upswing from recession lows, through 2014. In comparison, overall growth in all private sector employment, from the beginning of its recovery in 2010 to 2014, was just 10 percent.

Of course the report’s “superstars” saw much higher growth and longer recoveries. Santa Clara County tallied a 48 percent gain in tech/info jobs since 2009 and San Francisco was up by 41 percent from the same year.

Other Central Valley metropolitan areas where tech/info job growth outpaced the rebound in private sector employment were Redding, up 20 percent since 2012; Fresno, a 20 percent gain since 2011; Chico, up 16 percent since 2011; and Visalia, a 10 percent gain since 2012.

Yes, there was good tech/info job growth in San Joaquin County, but Jeffrey Michael, director of the Center for Business and Policy Research at University of the Pacific, suggested caution.

“We shouldn’t get too excited about it,” he said of the study in which he was not involved. “Even with this impressive percentage growth, the area is a long way from having a tech/info cluster.”

He said that that sector accounted for about 7 percent of all jobs statewide, but only 1 percent in San Joaquin County, known demographically as the Stockton metropolitan area.

“Nevertheless, there has been some notable tech/info job growth in recent years,” Michael said. “The Stockton MSA has added about 200 jobs in computer systems design and programming, and about 200 jobs in video production and sound recording in the past three years.”

But the gains were not evenly spread.

Some Valley areas saw relatively slow tech/info job growth. Stanislaus County, for example, saw tech-sector employment rise 5 percent since it began a late recovery in 2013, compared to overall private sector job growth of 9 percent since 2010. The Sacramento metro area has seen no growth in its tech/info employment yet, although overall private sector job growth is 11 percent since beginning to recover in 2011.

Michael Mandel, Progressive Policy’s chief economic strategist, also reported that tech sector growth is spilling over to the broader California economy.

Partly as a result, he said, “From 2009 to 2014 private sector employment outside of the tech/info sector rose by 11 percent in California, compared to an average of 8 percent in the rest of the country.”

In particular, he cited the high compensation received by tech/info workers.

While California private sector workers received an additional $117 billion in wages in 2014 compared to 2009, he said, “an astounding one-third, or $38 billion, came from the tech/info sector.”

In defining tech/info employment, the Washington-based think included the Internet industry, software and computer programming firms, cloud providers, communications and broadcast industries, the movie and music industries and the publishing industry.