The U.S. information technology (IT) sector added 7,300 jobs in February, according to CompTIA, a technology association.
Software and technology services added 5,500 new jobs in the US in February, and 16,800 so far this year.
Telecommunication sector added 1,900 jobs last month. The category of other information services, including search portals, also increased in February, by 1,400 positions.
Computer and electronics products manufacturing lost 800 jobs, while data processing, hosting and related services lost 700 jobs.
The second component of the nation’s IT workforce – IT occupations across all other industries – showed a decline of 61,000 jobs last month.
“IT occupation data tends to show a higher degree of volatility from month to month. In 2016, there were 7 months of job gains and five months of job losses. This reflects the normal pattern of labor turnover whereby workers may resign to seek new opportunities, retire or are laid off,” said Tim Herbert, senior vice president of research and market intelligence at CompTIA.
The number of IT occupation job postings in February totaled 107,900 against 16,700 from January. Software and application developers topped the list of positions employers were seeking to fill in February, with 55,000 job postings. Other in-demand occupations included computer systems engineers and architects, computer user support specialists, computer systems analysts, and web developers.
