Tampa Bay boasts second largest IT employment in the state

February 22, 2022

Tampa Bay continues to attract fast-growing tech companies to the area, and the availability of skilled talent is among the top reasons why. According to Chmura JobsEQ, Tampa Bay boasts the second largest IT employment in the state and a location quotient of .90, which is significantly higher than the state of Florida (.77) and the Miami area (.63), which has the largest total employment.

Location quotients compare the concentration of an industry within a specific area to the concentration of that industry nationwide. It’s a good way of discovering the industries or occupations that are truly unique and specialized in your regional economy (compared to the national average).

According to the IT Industry Spotlight from Chmura JobsEQ, over the past ten years ending 2020, employment in information technology added more than 8,700 jobs in the Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater MSA, growing 61%.

During the same time period, Tampa saw an increase of 62% or nearly 1,100 new business establishments. These new business formations are an important source of job creation in a regional economy, spurring innovation and competition, and driving productivity growth. This is a good indicator on the growth in the Tampa Bay Metro area.

According to this CIO.com article, Tampa alone makes up 25% of Florida’s tech jobs with an additional 2,000 jobs expected to be added in the coming year. Salaries are on the rise, too. The average tech salary in Tampa is $97,098 per year – a 10.6% increase from 2020, according to Dice.

Tampa Bay’s colleges, universities and computer training schools continue to educate and train the future workforce need to meet this demand. During the 2019-2020 academic year, more than 2,400 degrees were awarded in postsecondary programs linked to information technology.