Top 25 recession proof jobs – is yours on the list?

Every day you hear more and more about the slumping US economy. A report from the US Department of Labor states that for the first 6 months of 2008 the US job market has shed 438,000 jobs. What if any jobs are safe from this decline? Well the good news is if you are in the IT industry, your job is still a vital part of the economy.

According to the Jobfox Top 20 Most Recession-Proof Professions, Developers, Systems Administrators, Software Implementation Specialists, Database Administrators and Technology Executives are 5 of the top 25 positions to hold during these tough times.

The developer group (number 2 on the Jobfox report) has been singled out by the US Department of Labor to be, “among the fastest growing occupations through 2016”. In the article Five High-Demand Jobs in 2008, Robert McCauley of Robert Half International states that lead application developers could see an increase of 7.6% in base compensation in 2008. The most sought after skills in this area include .NET framework, C#, XML and Java Enterprise experience as well as developers who can interface with SQL and Oracle databases.

At number 6 on the Jobfox report, Networking/Systems Administration professionals are becoming more in demand as more and more companies see their computer networks as an integral part of their business success. In a report from the US Department of Labor, “Growth in computer support specialist jobs will be about as fast as the average, while growth in network and computer system administrator jobs will be much faster than average”. By faster than average, they expect that more than 150,000 jobs over what they had originally estimated will be available in this field.

Another familiar IT position, Database Administrator, is also included on the list of recession proof jobs, coming in at fourteenth place. Once again, from the Department of Labor, the number of database administrator jobs is expected to increase by 37% between 2006 and 2016. The other nice aspect to this position is that it has always had one of the highest base compensations of all of the IT jobs, but be prepared to put you time in, the big jump in pay comes after around 5 years of experience.

The final two IT jobs on the list are Business Analysis/Software Implementation (in eighth position) and Technology Executive (16th). Both of these jobs are fueled by the rapid change in the IT industry. Especially important are those people with mobile computing, integration, IT security and messaging experience.

So I guess the OSI/RM model was right all along, All People Seem To Need Data Processing (and if you got that joke you really need to get out more). Even in these tough times, there are still jobs to be had in the IT field, however depending on what part of the world you are in, your mileage may vary.