St. Louis Ranks #32 in CBRE’s Annual ‘Scoring Tech Talent’ Report

St. Louis ranks #32 overall in CBRE’s 2023 Scoring Tech Talent report, moving up six spots even as macroeconomic headwinds slowed tech talent hiring by major tech firms in North America, according to a new report from CBRE.

Overall, the U.S. and Canada added a net 760,000 tech talent jobs since 2020 across established hubs such as the San Francisco Bay Area, New York, Seattle and Vancouver as well as smaller markets like Nashville, Cleveland and Canada’s Waterloo Region. The number of U.S. tech talent workers increased 7.3% from May 2021 to May 2022, which is significantly higher than the 5% growth in total U.S. employment in May 2022. Software developers and programmers across all industries accounted for more than half of the new tech talent employment.

“St. Louis’s long history with ag tech provides the region with a unique, highly skilled talent pool that has proven to be invaluable to many new ag tech startups that have relocated here,” said David Kelpe, a Senior Vice President at CBRE in St. Louis. “In addition to talent, St. Louis benefits from its central location and accessibility to many U.S. farming areas.”

CBRE’s annual Scoring Tech Talent report covers 75 North American markets, ranks the top 50 tech markets in the U.S. and Canada and outlines tech talent labor market trends amid economic shifts and increased remote hiring. CBRE also ranks the Next 25 emerging tech markets on a narrower set of criteria. Tech talent is defined as 20 key tech professions – such as software engineers and systems and data managers – across all industries.

For the first time this year, CBRE’s report examines tech talent wages paid by tech companies based on geography. St. Louis had the 25th highest average annual wage for tech talent in the tech industry ($75,527). The San Francisco Bay Area ($185,425) and Seattle ($172,009) had the highest average wages, while Sacramento ($107,580) and Jacksonville ($105,353) were the highest among small markets.

St. Louis stood out in the report in several other key areas:

• St. Louis’ tech talent workforce of 57,070 grew by 7% from 2017 to 2022, adding 3,760 new tech jobs during that period.
• It has the 25th highest concentration of tech talent working within the tech industry (33.5%) among the top markets.
• It registered the 10th largest gain (17.5%) in residents in their 20s with college degrees from 2016 to 2021, which will fuel future tech workforce growth, and the 25th largest increase (10.8%)in residents in their 30s with college degrees, which is the largest demographic cohort in the tech workforce nationally.
• St. Louis creates more tech graduates (10,847 from 2017 to 2021) than tech jobs (790) from 2018 to 2022), meaning the market generates a surplus of tech talent for expanding and relocating companies.
• It has relatively affordable real estate costs for a leading tech hub. Among the top 50 markets, its average annual office asking rent ($21.95 per sq. ft.) is 14th least expensive, its average monthly apartment rent ($1,221 a month) is the 12th least expensive and its ratio of tech salary to apartment rent of 15.7% is the 10th lowest.

To download the full report, click here.

Additionally, CBRE’s latest tech talent analyzer provides an interactive, in-depth comparison of tech talent in different markets. For more information, click here.