U.S. employment and wages in 14 information sectors

I have another blog that deals with U.S. employment data from the information sector. This one provides May 2010 employment and wage data from fourteen 4- and 5-digit NAICS industry groups in the “Information Sector.”

Notes on the data

The BLS NAICS industry sector for “Information” was estimated to have total U.S. employment of 2,708,760 in May 2010. Because the BLS only counts each job once, and has many different industries reported, one can see these as a part of a larger information society economy. For example, education services or research and development services are reported in different high level NAISC industry categories. The occupation of “Entertainers and Performers, Sports and Related Workers” (occupation code 27-2099) is reported for 24 4-digit industry groups, including just two in the “Information” industries (5121 and 5151), and Musians and Singers (27-2042) are reported for twenty 4-digit industry groups, only one which is in the Information Sector. The occupation “Computer Systems Analysts” (code 15-1121) is reported separately for 185 4-digit industry sectors.

NAICS 51 is titled “the information sector” and is part of the service-providing industries supersector group. According to BLS:

The Information sector comprises establishments engaged in the following processes: (a) producing and distributing information and cultural products, (b) providing the means to transmit or distribute these products as well as data or communications, and (c) processing data.

The main components of this sector are the publishing industries, including software publishing, and both traditional publishing and publishing exclusively on the Internet; the motion picture and sound recording industries; the broadcasting industries, including traditional broadcasting and those broadcasting exclusively over the Internet; the telecommunications industries; Web search portals, data processing industries, and the information services industries.

The Information sector groups three types of establishments: (1) those engaged in producing and distributing information and cultural products; (2) those that provide the means to transmit or distribute these products as well as data or communications; and (3) those that process data.

Wage data for NAICS 51

The wage data shows a large disparities between the wages in the various sectors. The average annual wage for the Information Sector as a whole was $60,502, but there were considerable differences within industries and between industries.

At the bottom are wages in Motion picture, newspaper and radio broadcasting. At the higher end are wages for telecommunications, computing and software industry groups.

Interestingly, 37 percent of the employment for the Motion Picture and Video industry (Code 5121) is for Motion Picture and Video Exhibition sector (51213), where the median wage was just $18,540, and involved such tasks as selling popcorn and cleaning out theaters. For the whole Motion Picture and Video sector (5121), the median income was $35,940, or just 59 percent of the Information sector average. While the median incomes were relatively low, ranking 11th of those in the table below, the incomes of the persons in the 90th percentile of the Motion Picture and Video industries were ranked 3rd overall.

As noted in a previous blog, the employment for the Sound Recording industry is estimated by the BLS at just 16,000 persons, or .6 percent of all jobs for the information sector.

In general, based upon this data alone, it seems as though U.S. trade policy on intellectual property rights in the information sector favors lower wage industries over higher wage industry.

The following chart and table report employment and wages in the U.S. for 14 “information” sectors.