Labor Supply
I have searched far and wide and there are no labor supply numbers. It is easier to call employers and get the numbers of available jobs, but it is much harder to find out who is looking for a job in the field. It is because there are so many variables. Maybe I prefer computer science, but will also work in sales or marketing, as well. Some people don’t work because they can’t find a really good job and will want to work when the economy is doing quite well. Without the supply of labor numbers, demand numbers are actually meaningless. So, what can you do to find out what will be in demand?
Resume Baiting
Look in the newspaper and you will see a lot of jobs that ask you to send in their resume. What you don’t realize is that many of these employers have no plans of hiring anyone. They are simply looking to find out what the market can deliver. They may be making future plans and in some cases they are trying to bait their own employees to see if they are shopping around.
As an employee, you might try the same thing. Make up a resume of the qualifications you think you might acquire, in the future, and see how many calls for interviews you might get. This will open your eyes up much more than talking to a recruiter or reading some labor demand numbers.
Competition is Keen for High Paying Jobs
Some fields, like medical, restrict oversupply of workers in a particular field quite well. For example, pharmacy schools are not very numerous and the supply of graduates is compared with the supply of jobs. The medical community tries for market equilibrium. Still, there are privately owned pharmacy schools that try to graduate as many people as possible to make money and this can leave the market slightly unbalanced.
In business and sales and many other careers, there are thousands of applicants for a single position. It’s because there are so many people on the bottom trying to get up. You can only expect these top jobs if you have truly went the extra mile in preparation. It also helps a lot to be good at networking.
I bring this point up because many top jobs may have a lot of openings, but that doesn’t mean you can get one of those jobs very easily. It still takes a lot of preparation and work.
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