The technology industry is booming, as usual, and President Obama wants to use this to help counter wage stagnation. While the economy has been improving, the average wages in the United States haven’t, which is why Obama is launching an initiative that will help train more people for the high-paying technology jobs that are in such high demand at the moment.
The unemployment rate is the lowest it’s been since President Obama first took office, but American wages remain stagnant. Despite an average of 200,000 jobs created every month for the past 12 months, the highest growth in 37 years, the average American worker hasn’t budged much since the 1970’s, according to the Pew Research Center. However, there’s an opportunity to boost worker wages in the higher paying technology sector. The average web developer with an associates degree earns $62,000 a year at the beginning of their career. That’s nearly 50 percent more than someone with an equivalent degree, according to PayScale. It’s also a fast-growing industry, full of jobs that didn’t exist ten years ago. According to the White House, about half a million of the 5 million currently available jobs are in IT.