Data Science: Key to the Universe or Difficult Career?

Welcome back to the Recruitonomics Newsletter! This week, we’re exploring the data science profession – and asking whether it’s still as exciting as it was in the 2010s. Plus, we cover Claudia Goldin’s Nobel Prize and what her research means for female workers.?

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This Week on Recruitonomics:?

Data Science: The Not-So-Sexy Profession??

Eleven years ago, the fate of data scientists’ careers changed across the globe with the publication of a Harvard Business Review blog titled: “Data Scientist: The Sexiest Job of the 21st Century”. The article painted a compelling portrait of a highly proficient “data hacker” capable of coding, dissecting data, and effectively conveying insights to corporate leaders. The core message resonated and soon Google searches for the career exploded. The article sold the idea of becoming a data wizard to millions of students, resulting in the meteoric rise of computer science and statistics related degrees. Students were ecstatic to solve business problems using math and code – but has data science become “unsexy”??

Read the full article here.

What does this mean for recruiters??

For recruiters, often companies spend lavishly on hiring highly specialized computer scientists and statisticians, but are more frugal when they need to hire data analysts and engineers to build reports and maintain data sources. This does not mean the investment doesn’t pay off; it often does in miraculous ways. Understanding the true data needs of a company will go a long way to prevent incorrect hiring decisions.

Nobel Prize 2023: Understanding Women’s Labor Market Outcomes Throughout History?

Claudia Goldin is a U.S. economic historian and labor economist at Harvard University. Her research covers the impact of education and technology on labor market outcomes and inequality. She was awarded the Nobel Prize this year for her work on women’s labor market outcomes over time. Her studies uncovered that female labor force participation of married women followed a U-shaped curve over the last 200 years in advanced economies like the U.S. She was one of the first researchers to push back against the widespread view that female employment rates are positively related to economic development. Her historical research shows that it was very common for women in the pre-industrial society to work alongside their husbands in agriculture or various forms of family business. However, that started to change with industrialization because it became more difficult for married women to work from home and to combine work with family.?

Read the full article here.

What does this mean for recruiters??

One recent development in the labor market has been the emergence of remote work. The flexibility that remote work offers has enabled more women to enter the labor market. Female prime age labor force participation now exceeds the previous highest level achieved back in the spring of 2000. But being in the office can lead to more promotions and networking opportunities, so it’s yet to to be determined if remote work is an equalizer or amplifier of inequalities for women’s labor market outcomes.?

Job Boom Puts Bank of Canada on Edge for Rate Hike

The labor market in Canada continues to surprise markets and analysts. The economy added 64,000 new jobs in September, more than three times expectations. Wage growth remains elevated, feeding into still-high inflation. Strong economic growth with high consumer prices puts the Bank of Canada in a tough spot. Do they raise interest rates again and risk tipping the labor market into negative territory or stay put and hope inflation cools naturally? The past two data releases suggest the job market is hotter than realized, making the situation for the Bank of Canada more uncertain. For recruiters, filling open roles should continue to be competitive.??

Read the full article here.

What does this mean for recruiters?

Recruiters are dealing with a surprisingly hot labor market still – especially in the services sector. Recruiters in the food service and accommodation services sector, especially, are dealing with strong growth and a tight labor market.?

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Recently on Recruitonomics:

In September, the U.S. economy added an impressive 336,000 jobs and the unemployment rate remained constant at 3.8%. This jobs report is far from boring: these strong gains reverse a slowing trend we’ve been observing over the past couple of months. Additionally, this report does not look recessionary but it may be a little strong for the Fed’s appetite. The growth this month was hotter than expected – market expectations were closer to the 175,000-200,000 range. This 336,000 gain is certainly impressive, sweetened by upwards revisions for July and August’s data. The unemployment rate stayed steady at 3.8%, bringing the streak of below 4% unemployment to 22 months, the fourth longest in history. Worries of a recession seem far-fetched when considering nearly everyone who wants a job can get one.??

Read the full article here.

Affordable child care is the backbone of a thriving labor force. Dependable child care ensures working parents – and especially mothers – can balance work and family responsibilities. During the pandemic, the dangers of inadequate child care became abundantly clear. With in-person services shut down, many parents had to leave the workforce to take care of their children full time. As a result, the female labor force participation rate declined sharply and employment in the child care services sector crumbled. To account for the lack of child care services, which had struggled to recover from the onset of the pandemic, the federal government allocated funds towards these services through the American Rescue Plan of 2021. Over $24 billion of the trillion-dollar plan was dedicated to keeping child care centers open and their workforces on payroll. Now, that plan is coming to an end. What will be the impact on working mothers and child care centers??

Read the full article here.

What Recruitonomics is Reading:

The latest inflation data reiterated that the road to cooling inflation is going to be a bumpy one. Over the last twelve months, headline inflation is up 3.7%. However, core inflation – the headline numbers stripped of volatile food and energy prices – rose at a slightly worrisome pace, especially after months of slowing.??

Supercore inflation – stripped back even further to exclude housing – also increased last month. This is far from a victory – in fact it’s a slight wobble that complicates the Fed’s next interest rate decision.?

?More Data & Insights:

? "Greedflation" Isn't to Blame for High Inflation

? Is the American Rust Belt Primed for a Resurgence?

? Layered Risks to a Likely Soft Landing

Thank you for reading! Stay tuned for next week's Recruitonomics Newsletter and check out Recruitonomics.com for more data-driven insights.

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