IT employment rose by 0.5% in January to a total of nearly 5.3 million jobs, according to the TechServe Alliance, a trade association of IT and engineering staffing and solutions firms. Still, IT employment remained down by 1.3%, or 70,300 jobs, since before the start of the pandemic in January 2020. 

TechServe Alliance CEO Mark Roberts said the increase in employment is good news even if jobs haven’t yet returned to pre-Covid levels. 

“We have made extraordinary progress in recovering the jobs lost in the spring and early summer,” Roberts said. “Despite weakness in other parts of the jobs market, IT employment remains a bright spot given the critical role IT professionals are playing in digital transformation and enabling many sectors of the economy to continue to operate through remote work.” 

He noted IT staffing jobs have regained almost three-quarters of the jobs lost as a result of Covid-19. 

“If IT jobs growth continues at the current pace, I anticipate we will have regained all of the IT jobs lost and will post growth on a year-over-year basis within the next few months,” Roberts said. “By contrast, the overall jobs market is, unfortunately, expected to take years to fully recover.” 

Separately, engineering employment rose by 0.13% in January when compared to December for a total of nearly 2.6 million jobs. However, engineering jobs are still down by 74,900 year over year.