Narrative: II. a. 1. B.

Workforce Analysis 

To gain a better understanding of the workforce trends in the State of Colorado, state level data was compiled to have a holistic view of the workforce. The Talent Pipeline Report was published to guide Colorado towards its workforce goals. This document, in addition to labor market data from the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment (CDLE), was used to create the workforce analysis. 

Employment and Unemployment 

From June 2020 through June 2021, the overall unemployment rate was 7.1 percent, with June 2021 having an unemployment rate of 6.2 percent. The table below  looks at the unemployment rate of Coloradans by educational attainment. Those with a bachelor’s degree or higher have the lowest unemployment, and those with less than a high school diploma have an unemployment rate nearly two times higher at 8.8 percent

Source: Current Population Survey, 2020; 2020 American Community Survey, 1-year Estimates  

The 2021 Colorado Talent Pipeline Report explored the unemployment dynamics for different demographic populations within the state’s workforce. The table below reports the unemployment rate by race and ethnicity over  time.The overall rate for June 2020 through June 2021 was 7.1 percent. Individuals who identify as Hispanic or Latinx and Black or African American have higher unemployment rates at 8 percent and 13.5 percent, respectively, compared to individuals who identify as white at 5.7 percent. This data compared to 2019 data reinforce that the pandemic has exacerbated disparities that predated its impacts on our economy. 

Youth Unemployment: From November 2020 through October 2021, the unemployment rate for individuals ages 16-19 was 11.6 percent. This level has decreased by 4.1 percent relative to last year and continues to move closer to its pre-pandemic level of 7.7 percent in 2019. While the 16-19 age group appears to be hit the hardest relative to older cohorts, it is obvious that the effect of the pandemic on unemployment has varied across different races/ethnicities. Individuals ages 16-19 who identify as Hispanic or Latinx were most severely impacted through this lens, a surprising outcome as this group’s labor force participation rate has recovered the swiftest for both males and females outside of this age category. 

It is important to note that data indicating unemployment rates for Coloradans 16-19 years old are typically turbulent and less stable from year to year. Due to small sample sizes, Black or African American unemployment data for this age group that has been available in previous years is not available for 2021.

Notably, the 16-19 age group has also seen the most recovery emerging from the pandemic, with the August 2021 national employment level 0.8 percent higher than February 2020. This effect can partially be explained by the large concentration of individuals in this age group in the leisure and hospitality workforce, which saw large drop-offs at the start of the pandemic due to shutdowns but is now experiencing a labor shortage across the state.

New Americans: New American communities have long played a vital cultural and economic role in Colorado, contributing to shared prosperity and wellbeing through their hard work, dedication, and love for our state. The community is continuing to grow and diversify. In 2021, more than 30 percent of Colorado immigrants have attained an advanced degree, and more than 2,000 are foreign-trained healthcare providers, including the hundreds who have arrived through the refugee program in the past several years.37 27.3 percent of immigrants have less than a high school diploma and yet have ample skills in industries like construction, farming, entrepreneurship, or cosmetology.36 Some spent decades in refugee camps; still others arrived on a student visa to study at one of our higher education institutions or were recruited to fill a workforce gap in one of our crucial industries. There were 11,631 international students enrolled at Colorado colleges and universities in 2021, providing an economic contribution of $428.8 million. 

At the state level in 2021, immigrants made up one-eighth of Colorado’s workforce, with 89.9 percent of foreign-born Coloradans between the ages of 16 and 64. This could be vital to the state’s workforce in the long run – as Colorado’s population continues to age, the immigrant population will become even more critical to the state’s economy and wellbeing: research suggests that Coloradans will increasingly depend on immigrant tax contributions and labor, including in areas such as home healthcare that serve the older adult population.

Already, Colorado depends on foreign-born labor for some of its most crucial industries, like tourism, construction, and technology. This year, immigrant workers provided approximately 25 percent of the workforce for traveler accommodation, a key occupation in our tourism industry. Mountain communities with international reputations for their world-class ski resorts, like Vail, Telluride, and Aspen, depend on immigrants as essential to their economic engines. In addition, 13 percent of STEM workers in Colorado are immigrants, helping shepherd the growth of this important sector, especially as many economies, like Denver’s, move away from an over-reliance on oil and gas. 

Similar to the state’s total workforce population, Colorado’s immigrant population has a high percentage of entrepreneurs who create jobs. As of October 2021, over 36,000 immigrant entrepreneurs employ 102,298 workers in Colorado.36 Many of these entrepreneurs start small businesses such as restaurants, insurance companies, and adult care centers. This aligns with the national trend, with immigrants creating approximately 25 percent of new businesses in the U.S. according to the National Bureau of Economic Research.38 The 42,844 immigrants who are sole proprietors in Colorado account for 12 percent of all self-employed residents, generating $1 billion in business income. 

As of October 2021, Colorado immigrants made up nearly a quarter of the pharmaceutical manufacturing (24.8 percent) and medical equipment and supplies manufacturing (23.9 percent) industries, as well as 15.6 percent of pharmacy and drug store workers. Approximately 80 percent of Colorado’s immigrants have a status that makes them eligible to work, including those with temporary work authorization (such as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA)) or with lawful status (such as refugees or naturalized citizens). 

Individuals with Disabilities: Employment of people with disabilities has surpassed pre-pandemic levels and has reached historic highs in recent months, with this cohort’s labor force participation rate equating to 36.8 percent in October 2021, the highest recording since the Bureau of Labor Statistics began recording employment numbers in 2008. This is a boost of about 10.5 percent relative to the same time last year and holds a magnitude significantly higher than the year-over-year increase across the non-disabled workforce, who only saw an uptick of 0.5 percent when comparing the periods. This is a key indication that people with disabilities are recovering faster than people without disabilities, and we can expect this labor force to continue to grow as more individuals with disabilities are provided opportunities for employment and enter the market. As of October 2021, the population of people with disabilities represents 3.6 percent of the total U.S. workforce.

According to the most recent data update from the American Community Survey (ACS), there are an estimated 559,347 Coloradans who identify as living with a disability. This number translates to representing about 12.1 percent of Colorado’s aggregate population. While lagged state-level data prohibits us to interpret emerging employment trends of this cohort and their impacts on advancing Colorado’s economic recovery, in 2019 only 31 percent of individuals with disabilities were employed in the state (compared to 71.6 percent of the total state population ages 16 and over who do not have disabilities).41 

Over 25 percent of Coloradans with disabilities have a bachelor’s degree or higher and 33.8 percent have attained some college courses or received a degree from a two-year program. Notably, the latter surpassed Colorado’s annual attainment level for people without disabilities by approximately 5.8 percentage points. When compared to the workforce population without disabilities, Coloradan workers with disabilities make up larger shares of the following occupations in the state: 

Service Occupations (20.9 percent vs. 16.6 percent) 

Sales and Office Occupations (21.2 percent vs. 19 percent) 

Natural Resources, Construction, and Maintenance Occupations (9.3 percent vs. 8.8 percent) 

Production, Transportation, and Material Moving Occupations (13.4 percent vs. 9.6 percent) 

Frequently the first and most intractable barrier underemployed or unemployed Coloradans with disabilities face is an over-emphasis on what is expected that he or she cannot, should not, or is not doing. The lack of balance between a focus on functional limitation rather than on the person’s talent and ambitions is expensive and wasteful. The workforce development system in Colorado is committed to providing the high-quality services necessary to prepare individuals with disabilities to compete for jobs and fully participate in Colorado’s workforce. 

Labor Market Trends 

Colorado’s labor market recovery from the pandemic recession continues at a rapid pace, although encumbrances linger. Supplemental federal unemployment benefits ended in Colorado on September 4, 2021, but job openings have continued to outpace job seekers (with the latter group remaining in decline throughout 2021 due to the pandemic’s viral-related impacts). In late August, there were 122,000 jobs advertised on Connecting Colorado (a resource provided for job seekers to access job postings statewide and for employers to post current openings). From August to September, employers in Colorado added 5,100 nonfarm payroll jobs for a total of 2,741,100 jobs. Private sector payroll jobs increased 8,400 and the government sector shed 3,300 jobs.

Through this lens, Colorado has seen a significant rebound in employer demand, gaining 302,200 private payroll jobs from April 2020 to September 2021, representing a job recovery rate of about 83 percent (surpassing the national average by roughly two percent during the same period). While the labor shortage continues to create market inefficiencies, Colorado’s employment-to-population ratio remains one of the highest in the U.S., ranking seventh nationally in August. 

The industry sectors with the fastest payroll job recovery rates from April 2020 - September 2021 were: 

• Transportation Warehousing and Utilities (>100%) 
• Management of Companies and Enterprises  (>100%) 
• Professional, Scientific, and Technical (>100%) 
• Wholesale rade  (>100%) 

As of July 2021, estimated total nonfarm payroll jobs for the year were revised upward to approximately 2.8 million statewide. This change brings the yearly payroll job growth estimates from January 2021 through July 2021 to 167,200, or 6.4 percent. Looking forward at the 2022 calendar year, CDLE’s Labor Market Information team expects to see higher numbers of payroll job numbers during the first quarter from professional and business services (~6,000), construction (~4,700), education and health services (~4,400), financial activities (~3,900), leisure and hospitality (~3,300), other services (~2,600), information (~2,600), and manufacturing (~1,600). 

Few industries are expected to undergo job losses in the near-term, however, employers shedding positions will most likely be due to: 

Skill mismatches between employer demand and the labor pool; 

Changes in job preferences across job seekers; 

The slowdown in services that spiked during the pandemic; or 

Lack of consumer confidence (largely resulting from the increase in Delta variant caseloads). 

Over the course of 2021, the average workweek for all Colorado employees on private nonfarm payrolls increased from 32.9 to 33.5 hours, while average hourly earnings increased from $31.02 to $32.46, a dollar and sixty-one cents more than the national average hourly earnings of $30.85. 

Education and Skill Levels of the Workforce 

As showcased in prior Talent Pipeline Reports, there are still significant attainment gaps between demographic groups in 2021 within the state. Specifically, Colorado has significant gaps in educational attainment when measured by race and ethnicity. When compared to the statewide attainment goal of 66 percent, the following racial and ethnic disparities currently exist in 2021: 

White - 59.2 percent attainment rate (a gap of 6.8 percent) 

Black or African American – 37.9 percent attainment rate (a gap of 28.1 percent) 

American Indian – 30.9 percent attainment rate (a gap of 35.1 percent) 

Hispanic and/or Latinx – 25.1 percent attainment rate (a gap of 40.9 percent) 

Looking forward, it is projected that 33.7 percent of Colorado’s 18 to 64 year old population will be Hispanic and/or Latinx by 2050, compared to 21.7 percent projected in 2020. Strategies to ensure all Coloradans receive the education and training they need to successfully participate in the labor force will be pivotal over the next 30 years. 

Skill Gaps 

Eighty-six percent of Colorado employers reported that the importance of education and credentials hasn’t changed over the past two years. We find slightly more of a sense of increase surrounding the skills and competencies of the workforce, but overall this too has remained balanced. 

There is a strong correlation between importance and need for development where increased importance is positively associated with need. Colorado employers are further met with challenges when helping their staff develop these critical skills, as the top ranked skills are also positively correlated with difficulty of training. What has been shown from the national data is that going back for professional development accelerates the development of these skills and, in particular, the five top-ranked choices. According to the 2021 Colorado Bridging the Talent Gap Employer-based Survey, the most important skills to employers last year were: 

• Teamwork/Collaboration
• Communication  
• Orientation to detail 
• Service orientation
• Critical thinking 
• Organizing, planning, and prioritizing