What Are the Most American Jobs? 🇺🇸
Happy 4th of July!
Small business ownership is the most American job, as it is overrepresented in the US workforce compared to other countries. The ease of doing business in the US contributes to a thriving entrepreneurial culture in the US.
Realtor is the second most American occupation, in no small part due to the pandemic housing boom.
Industry clusters shape the occupation specialties in each state. Software engineering is the skill specialty of Washington state (home to Amazon and Microsoft headquarters) and investment banking is the skill specialty in New York thanks to Wall Street.
Happy July 4th! This week, Revelio Labs celebrates America’s birthday by delving into the specialties of America’s workforce composition. Which occupations are the most “American,” or in other words, overrepresented among the US workforce relative to other countries?
Small business ownership is the most overrepresented job in the US workforce relative to the rest of the world. On average, the fraction of small business owners of the total workforce is 2.38 percentage points higher in the US than in other countries. This might not come as a surprise as the US ranks very highly in the World Bank's Ease of Doing Business Index. In particular, getting credit and resolving insolvency are the easiest in the US compared to other economies, making the US the nation of entrepreneurship. The second most American occupation is Realtor. Data from the National Association of Realtors published in the New York Times shows that a record number of real estate licenses were issued during the pandemic due to the pandemic housing boom.
Next, we examine the occupation specialty in each state in the map below. A state's specialty occupation is the occupation that is overrepresented in the state workforce composition relative to other states. Patterns of the map below reveal the main industry clusters in the US. For example, Software Engineers are overrepresented in Washington state, where the headquarters of Amazon and Microsoft are. In the East Coast, Revelio Labs sees that investment banking is overrepresented in New York thanks to the financial industry cluster in Wall Street. At the same time, Researchers are overrepresented in Massachusetts as Greater Boston is the top life sciences cluster in the US.
