Computer Science Job Outlook, Computer Science Job Growth, and Computer Programming Job Outlook
In an ever-changing world of technology, the computer science job outlook is strong.
Computer science is one of the fastest growing academic disciplines today for an excellent future career pathway. Your Bachelor of Science in Computer Science at Houston Christian University positions you for a wide range of tech positions in all types of business and industry.
Nationwide, there is strong computer science job demand for computer science experts in government and public sectors, in corporations of all sizes, in nonprofit organizations, and in colleges and universities.
Employment of computer science and information technology occupations is projected to grow 13 percent through 2026, faster than the average for all occupations, and add about 557,100 new jobs, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). Demand for IT workers with computer science skills is the result of greater emphasis on cloud computing, the collection and storage of big data, and information security.
What can you do with a computer science degree?
“Software, data and emerging tech skills continue to be hot commodities in the job market; which often overshadows the fact that employers are also in a hiring mode for many core positions, such as networking, IT support and cybersecurity,” said Tim Herbert, senior vice president for research and market intelligence at CompTIA, a leading technology industry association.
In 2017, nearly 5.4 million individuals worked as technology professionals across the US economy, CompTIA reports. This represents an increase of 2.1 percent, or nearly 110,000 net new jobs. Growth in the tech occupation category is also expected to hold steady in the year ahead.
Nearly 4 in 10 US IT firms report having job openings and are actively recruiting candidates for technical positions.
Hiring intent is most concentrated among large- and medium-size firms. –CompTIA
A separate CompTIA analysis of employer job posting data finds that companies advertised for more than 282,000 positions in emerging technologies year-to-date, an increase of 65 percent over the same period in 2017. In comparison, overall IT job postings recorded a 30 percent increase year-over-year.
Within specific emerging tech job categories, job postings are very strong:
- Blockchain positions are up 370 percent year-over-year
- Artificial intelligence: up 149 percent
- Machine learning: up 99 percent
- Big data: up 41 percent
Computer science job placement
Graduates currently work in a range of computer science career positions, including:
- Director of IT
- Programmer
- Web developer
- Clinical systems analyst
- Professor in IT or computer science
- Software engineer
- Applications analyst
As firms increasingly expand their operations to digital platforms, professionals with computer science and information systems degrees will be responsible for implementing these goals, and demand will grow, resulting in a promising IT job outlook, according to the BLS.
The increasing reliance upon enterprise software for daily business operations, and the primacy of e-commerce platforms for shopping and retailing, suggests a strong software engineer job outlook and computer programming job outlook. Programmers in particular are one of the highest paid computer science positions.
Computer science careers will also expand with new jobs to bolster cybersecurity in computer and information systems used by businesses. Industries such as retail trade will need to implement more robust security policies as cyber threats increase, resulting in a positive computer engineering job outlook.
Also impacting computer science jobs in the future, says CompTIA, is that an increase in the popularity of cloud computing may result in firms outsourcing services from in-house IT departments to cloud-computing companies. This will shift IT services from IT departments in non-computer industries, such as financial firms or schools, to firms engaged in computer systems design and related services, and those in data processing, hosting and related services.
