Because marijuana remains illegal at the federal level, it isn’t possible to get accurate statistics about the jobs available in the industry from federal agencies like the Bureau of Labor Statistics. However, Whitney Economics and Leafly.com decided to painstakingly gather the data from each state where cannabis is legal and their findings are eye-catching.
The data analysts discovered that so far, the legal cannabis industry has created 211,000 full-time jobs within the U.S. This shows that the industry is one to watch if the problem of unemployment is to be tackled.
The statistics collected show that out of the 211,000 full-time jobs created so far, 64,000 were filled in 2018 alone. Not bad for an industry that remains illegal at the federal level.
There is no indication that the increase in cannabis jobs is going to slow down any time soon. For example, 2017 saw a 21 percent increase in the number of jobs created in the industry while that number jumped to 44 percent in 2018. 2019 should show a higher rise in the percentage of new jobs created.
You may be wondering how the cannabis workforce increase compares to other sectors/industries. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, three industries are likely to have the highest increase in jobs over the coming ten years.
The demand for wind turbine technicians is expected to increase by 96 percent while the demand for solar voltaic installers is likely to increase by 105 percent. The need for home health care aides will rise by 47 percent. All these figures predict workforce increases over at least a decade. However, the data collected by Leafly and Whitney Economics shows that the marijuana industry will achieve a 110 percent increase in jobs created in just over three years!
The figures get even more astounding when they are broken down on a state-by-state basis. For example, Florida saw a 703 percent increase in the cannabis jobs created during 2018. New York ended 2018 with an extra 5,000 full-time jobs in the cannabis industry, marking an increase of 278 percent.
Five states (Oklahoma, California, Arkansas, Massachusetts and Florida) are currently in need of thousands of employees in the cannabis sector, and this demand may keep rising over the coming years as the industry matures. Net Element, Inc. (NASDAQ: NETE) and Phivida Holdings Inc. (CSE: VIDA) (OTCQX: PHVAF) welcome the research done by Leafly and its partners since this data proves that cannabis can bring huge economic benefits wherever it is legalized.
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