The Future of Work in The United States

The May 25 issue of Time Magazine had an intriguing article on the Future of Work.  Here are some of their projections.

 

-          The greatest growth in jobs will occur in Texas, New Mexico, Florida, Nevada, and Georgia.

  -   The least growth in jobs will be in Michigan, Ohio, Vermont, Connecticut, and Wisconsin.

-          The jobs with the highest growth rates in the next ten years are retail salespersons, office workers, nurses, food service workers, teachers, and home health aides.

-          The jobs predicted to have the fastest growth rates are home health aides, personal and home-care aides, computer software engineers, medical assistants, network systems analysts, and financial advisors.

-          Fewer companies will offer retirement savings and health care plans.

-          The corporate ladder which already has less rungs than it used to will be replaced by the corporate lattice.  Employees will take more lateral moves and wind their way up the lattice.

-          Boomers will work longer than planned as their savings and investments have eroded in recent years.

-          More women will move into senior management positions which will make companies more profitable.  A study of 353 of the FORTUNE 500 companies found that those with the most women in senior management had a higher return of equities – by more than a third.

-          Your future boss will not look and act like your current boss as more Gen Xers move into leadership roles and manage differently.

-          We will see more job sharing in the future even at senior levels.

-          Companies will rely more and more on independent contractors and consultants in the future.  40% of the segment of the US workforce is predicted to be independent contractors by 2019, up from 26% today.

-          Telecommuting will become more popular in the future.  28% of the workforce will telecommute full or part-time, up from 12% in 2000.