Follow Your Heart to a Caring Career in Minnesota
June is the kick off for the Follow Your Heart to a Caring Career campaign, including a proclamation from the Governor explaining the benefits of working in Health Care & Social Assistance. DEED's Regional Analysts put together a series of blogs focused on Health Care employment and opportunities in all 6 planning regions:
Central | Northeast | Northwest | Southeast | Southwest | Twin Cities
For more local information, reach out to your Regional Analyst!
Jobs that support or provide health care for others can be an excellent career while also providing a necessary service in the region. Opportunities to work in the Health Care industry range from entry level occupations that can be attained with a high school diploma or less to highly skilled, experienced and educated occupations that require advanced degrees. The variety of occupations means there is something for everyone if a career in health care is desired.
If you're looking for work in a high-demand field, look no further than healthcare. According to DEED's Job Vacancy Survey (JVS), employers in the Twin Cities metro area reported over 25,400 job vacancies in Health Care & Social Assistance in 2022. This accounted for over one-quarter (25.9%) of the region's total job vacancies at that time. While slightly down from its peak number of job vacancies in 2021, the number of job vacancies in Health Care & Social Assistance is up by more than 75% from 2017, showing extreme demand.
Even as Nursing & Residential Care Facilities employment fell, wages for workers in the industry rose. Since 2019, the average annual wage for the industry increased 23.4%, more than six percentage points higher than the average wage growth of the region. Part of the higher-than-average increase can be attributed to emergency funding via the CARES Act that was directed to long-term care facilities in 2020. More recently, the Minnesota Department of Human Services allocated $50 million to address staffing shortages at nursing facilities.
The good news is that Northwest Minnesota is closer to pre-pandemic employment levels than any other region. However, while Health Care & Social Assistance sector employment is closer to 2018 levels in the Northwest than any Greater Minnesota region other than Southeast, it is still below pre-pandemic levels. This is not due to a lack of job openings; job vacancies in the Health Care sector are up nearly 19% from 2021, and part-time vacancies are down 15%.
The Health Care & Social Assistance industry is the largest employing industry in Southeast Minnesota, with 1,892 establishments providing 65,463 jobs. Remarkably, this industry accounts for 27% of total employment in Southeast, highlighting its significant contribution to the local economy. In 2022, the average annual wage was $80,600, which was 31.8% higher than the average annual wage across all industries.
Despite cutting more than 2,000 jobs over the past four years due to the Pandemic Recession, Health Care & Social Assistance still provides more than 29,000 jobs in the region, accounting for 17% of total employment, or one in every 6 jobs. It was easily the largest growing industry in the region over the past two decades, even with the recent job losses, adding more than 5,700 jobs since 2000.
Labor Market Training Sessions
DEED's Regional Analysts scheduled a set of Labor Market Information training sessions in the spring and summer of 2023. These hands-on training sessions - whether virtual or in-person - were designed to help attendees learn where to find and how to use DEED’s labor market information data tools. Attendees will navigate data tools on our website (www.mn.gov/deed/data/) and learn how to use them to understand the local economy and provide guidance to jobseekers and others.
Only 2 sessions remain:
June 28 - Virtual: Using Wage Data by Occupation to Ensure Wages Are Competitive (OEWS Training)
June 29 - Thief River Falls: LMI Data Tool Training
Please reach out to your regional analyst if you or your staff would be interested in having a customized LMI training session. We would be happy to accommodate your training requests, either on LMI Data Tools or local economic conditions!
2023 Connecting Entrepreneurial Communities Conference -
New London MN - Thursday, Sept. 14 - Friday, Sept. 15
Entrepreneurs will help create the future of Minnesota. For the fifth year, the Connecting Entrepreneurial Communities conference will bring together community champions, entrepreneurship enablers, economic development professionals, entrepreneurs and business leaders.
The conference is being led by University of Minnesota Extension Department of Community Development and joined by the Minnesota Small Business Development Centers, Rethos, Launch Minnesota, Minnesota Department of Employment & Economic Development, and other entrepreneurship supporting organizations.
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