Utilizing Opportunity Occupations Data for Recovery

The COVID-19 pandemic has created an unprecedented economic crisis, with tens of millions of American workers losing their jobs since March. The disproportionate impact of this crisis on women, communities of color, and particularly those in lower-wage occupations, highlights the need to address intergenerational racial inequity with programs and policies that connect workers to quality jobs. But understanding which jobs are available in a local labor market is often a challenge. Local labor markets can often be quite unique. They might have different skill needs for specific jobs, and in some markets, employers need completely different skills for the same occupations for which they are hiring. Think about a computer user-support specialist, for example. One might work for a retailer largely helping people set up devices and performing basic troubleshooting, while another might work for a research organization providing sophisticated networking and information security support. Much of the labor market data that is available does not take into account the localized and different skills needs of work. The Opportunity Occupations Monitor combines a number of data sources, including traditional labor data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and O*NET, with real-time labor market data from Burning Glass Technologies to provide more locally specific information on jobs that are available. We have just updated the tool with 2019 data and will update the tool again in early 2021 with data from 2020 to reflect changes due to the COVID-19 pandemic.