Recruitment company Harnham's new figures show the industry is booming - and not only in Silicon Valley. In fact, in the first six months of 2019, the number of data science job openings on the East Coast increased by 273% compared to the same period last year. This year, data science workers were up 174% on the West Coast.
Other fields of data and analysis also saw this year's "major growth," the company said. On the East Coast, job openings for computer engineering rose by 252% and on the West Coast by 150%. All data analytics roles across the country have increased by 150%.
According to Glassdoor's work and hiring platform, data scientist is the number one job in America for 2019 for the fourth consecutive year. This has a $108,000 annual base salary and a 4.3 out of 5 job satisfaction ranking. As of January 2 in the US, there were some 6,510 active job vacancies.
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It's also a great time to be a data scientist entering the job market according to recent data from job sites Indeed and Dice.
Indeed's January survey reported a year-over-year 29% increase in demand for data scientists and a 344% dramatic growth since 2013. But while demand continues to rise rapidly in the form of job posts, searches by job seekers specialized in data science have risen at a slower rate of 14%, indicating a gap between supply and demand.
Likewise, data from Dice's technology job site showed the number of data science job posts on its website - as a proportion of total job posts - has risen by about 32 percent year-over-year, and the site sees data science as a "high-demand talent." Dice noted that job posts are from businesses across a wide range of industries, not in tech companies.
Forrester Research analyst Brandon Purcell said demand for data scientists is only going to increase as companies are increasingly relying on insights powered by data.
In order to acquire and retain the increasingly empowered customers of today, companies need to make use of their data insights to personalize experiences on a scale, Purcell said. He added that in turning the massive amount of data companies capture into action, data scientists are crucial.
The growth in AI and machine learning can also lead to the dramatic increase in data scientists demand. Purcell clarified that this is a lot about branding. Most companies see data scientists as the secret to accepting AI or machine learning, the hottest technologies out there.
Sadly, the truth is that data scientists are just a small part of the AI strategy of an enterprise according to Purcell. It is also important for data engineers who understand where data resides and what it comprises, as are experts from DevOps who can operationalize a machine learning model on a scale.
According to Dice, the number of job openings for the relevant and much-discussed deep learning capability has more than doubled year after year.
