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A Look Into the Current Dallas, Texas Job Market

Chances are, you need to hire — and you’re not alone. As an employer in the Dallas, Texas area, you’ve likely felt the hit of the labor shortage, so you’re wondering what you can do to attract top talent. Being in the know about the current job market is a great way to start. The more informed you are, the better equipped you are to make openings at your company seriously attractive to top talent.

Here’s a look at the Dallas job market as of February 2022, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The unemployment rate is high.

On a national level, the unemployment rate has been steadily declining since it peaked at 14.7% in April 2020. In fact, it tumbled all the way down to 3.8% in February 2022. While the unemployment rate in Dallas is nowhere near the U.S. average during the height of the pandemic, it’s still much higher than the national average — 7.4%, as of February 2022, to be exact.

Some jobs are more in demand than others.

As expected the unemployment rate in Dallas isn’t stagnant across industries. Some industries have sky-high unemployment rates, while others are actually below the national average. Some of the industries with the highest levels of unemployment include leisure and hospitality (18%), professional and business services (11.4%), and information (8.7%), as of February 2022. On the other end of the spectrum, the government had a -0.1% unemployment rate, followed by 2.3% in the manufacturing field.

Many average hourly wages are below the national average.

This isn’t the case for every job type in the Dallas area, but several highlighted by the BLS have a lower average hourly rate than the U.S. average for the job type. Generally speaking, the average hourly pay for all job types in the Dallas area is $27.89, while the average hourly rate in the U.S. is a slightly higher $28.01.

For example, construction laborers earn an average of $17.83 per hour in the Dallas area, but nationally, the average pay is $21.22 per hour. Additionally, retail salespeople earn an average of $14.95 in the Dallas area, but the average hourly pay for this job type in the U.S. is $15.35.

However, it’s worth noting that both human resource managers and accountants, and auditors in Dallas earn a slightly higher average hourly rate than the national average.