Where The Jobs Are ... and Aren’t

by R.L. Nave
December 21, 2011

Where are the jobs? Everybody should move to North Dakota, where there are more jobs than people and more people than housing. But you don't have to go so far as Fargo to find work. While Mississippi has more folks out of work than a lot of other places, growth is happening here, too. The Mississippi Department of Employment Security projects job growth of close to 13 percent from 2008 to 2018. So the jobs are there—if you know where to look.

Highest-paying Occupations, Nationwide
Management $105,440 per year
Legal $96,940
Computer and mathematical $77,230
Architecture and engineering $75,550
Health care practitioners and technical $71,280
Business and financial operations $67,690

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics


Projected Growth, Statewide 2008-2018
Biomedical engineers 80 percent
Fitness trainers and aerobics instructors 42 percent
Occupational therapist aides 50 percent
Anthropology and archeology teachers, postsecondary 50 percent
Medical scientists, except epidemiologists 50 percent
Home health aides 49.9 percent
Athletic trainers 42.9 percent
Financial examiners 40 percent
Environmental engineering technicians 40 percent

Source: Mississippi department of employment security


Jackson Projected Growth 2008- 2018
Total 13.9 percent


Top Growth Industries, Statewide
Social assistance 29.9 percent
Professional, scientific, technical services 29.3 percent
Ambulatory health care 28.2 percent
Amusement, gambling, recreation 25.1 percent
Museums and historical sites 23.1 percent


Top Negative Growth, Statewide
Textile mills 50 percent
Apparel manufacturing 12.5 percent
Miscellaneous manufacturing 7.7 percent
Beverage/tobacco Products manufacturing 6.7 percent
Crop production 3.7 percent


#CrazyJob
We asked Twitter followers to share their craziest jobs.

@Amayjuan_Zetta: Hoping to make bank as a server
@dandraorey: Opening up a gym at 5 am And parking cars at a hotel, arguing over who's next ... with 2 master degrees
@flipflops: busser/waitress at an American Legion. Since they fought for their country, they felt entitled to leer. I was 15.
@justincook: I was a janitor in a hospital. MEDICAL WASTE.
@donnerkay: I was a shampoo girl in a Neshoba Cty beauty shop run by racists.
@eddieoutlaw: I stocked office supplies at Kinkos while in hair school ... Wild, I know.
@GWSchulzCIR: Repairing newspaper boxes in San Francisco. You would not believe the things people put in them on the street.
@JusBeinMichael No lie. Picture it. Me. I was a butcher's assistant in a Forest, MS, small town grocery store. I cut meat & cleaned the meat saws.

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