Service jobs - Administrative and Support

Administrative and Support and Waste Management and Remediation Services (revised fall 2024)

This sector has two parts: the administrative and support part and the waste management and remediation part. Together they are 9.457 million jobs by 2024. Employment in the first nearly doubled from 1990 to 2007 reaching 8.067 million in 2007, but dropped during the 2008-2010 recession to a low of 6.857 million. Employment has recovered until the 2024 high. The waste management and remediation remains small but with steady job growth from 1990 when employment was 229.4 thousand jobs to the beginning of 2024 when employment reached 500.2 thousand jobs.  

Administrative and Support

In the NAICS documentation manual, administrative and support firms perform routine support activities for day-to-day operations of other businesses on a contract or fee basis. The definition does not tell us what companies in this sector actually do. The answer is lots of things. If I were going to work in this sector I would definitely pick a job in a travel agency. I can picture myself relaxing in a cheery office full of travel posters offering a witty patter of conversation describing sunny Caribbean tour sites. Pick your favorite! There are so many choices. Try a job in contracted office administration, facilities support services, employment placement, temporary help services, desktop publishing, word processing, telephone call centers, telephone answering services, telemarketing bureaus, copy centers, private mail centers, collection agencies, credit bureaus, repossession companies, court reporter companies, tour operators, convention bureau services, ticket services, investigation services, armored car services, security guards and patrol services, security systems companies, exterminating companies, pest control companies, janitorial service companies, landscaping companies, carpet and upholstery cleaning services, chimney sweep companies, packaging and labeling services, convention and trade show organizers, and a few more, but I am out of breath.

Administrative and Support establishments sell almost everything they do to other establishments on a contract or fee basis and not to final consumers, and they generally sell a combination of one or more support services. Travel agencies and some travel and tour companies are the only exception. Otherwise services in this sub sector support other firms by performing contracted activities with performance criteria carried out during a contract period. Establishment managers who are thinking of out-sourcing a function like office administration are thinking of another firm taking over complicated and distracting financial planning, billing, record keeping or logistics that are not a part of their real business. Having a firm concentrate on a core business is a favorite selling point in outsourcing firms, an industry where outsource firms actively promote outsourcing as a good idea. Selling outsourcing to prospective clients requires a combination of convenience and cost saving.

Outsourcing of work from one establishment to another had 4.416 million jobs in 1990.  By 2007 outsourcing jobs jumped to just over 8 million, but took a sharp drop of 1.2 million jobs in the recession years of 2008 to 2010. Jobs recovered after the recession and have continued to grow, reaching 8.956 million by 2024.

Outsourcing office administration services continues to increase and reached an all time high of 620.4 thousand jobs by 2024. Establishments that outsource facilities support service provide operating staff to perform a combination of building services such as janitorial services, laundry, maintenance, security, and landscaping. Employment in facilities support services, although fewer than office administration, continue to growth and reached a high of 169.3 thousand jobs by 2024. Other business support services include document preparation service, telephone call centers and answering services, telemarketing bureaus, business service centers, collection agencies and a few more. These jobs combined reached a high of 912 thousand in 2016 but have settled back to 744 thousand by 2024.

Travel agencies and reservations services had more jobs in 1990 than in 2024 when they were 190.8 thousand. Investigation and security services have increased from 207.5 thousand in 1990 and just topped the 1 million job mark at the end of 2023. Outsourcing services to buildings has also been a source of job growth. Janitorial services have the most jobs in services to buildings. It topped a million jobs in 2013 and has remained above a million jobs since then. Landscaping service jobs at establishments have grown from just below 300 thousand in 1990 to 886.6 thousand by 2024: exterminating services, carpet cleaning services and a variety of building maintenance services to building exteriors, chimneys, ducts, drains, gutters, driveways and parking lots. Combined jobs in building services have more than doubled since 1990 to 2024 when jobs total 2.251 million, at annual growth rates more than double that for national establishment employment.

Employment services have almost 39 percent of the jobs in business support services. Employment service jobs have three sub sectors: employment placement agencies, temporary help services, and professional employer organizations. Their job total at the beginning of 2024 was 3.640 million. While all the business support services rise and fall in response to recession and recovery they show a general trend upward over the years since 1990. 

The NAICS manual explains that employment placement services list employment vacancies and refer applicants. Temporary help establishments supply their employees to supplement the work force of a client, but the client must supervise their work. Professional employer organizations “typically acquire and lease back some or all of the employees of their clients and serve as the employer of the leased employees for payroll, benefits, and related purposes.” 

A system of outsourcing employment generates a cycle of bidding for contracts for landscaping, security services, janitorial services and also with temporary help services by bidding directly for available work. Custodians, for example, work for contracting firms that constantly bid new contracts. Contracts tend to be one to three years, but allow cancellation on 30 days notice. It is labor intensive work. Seventy five to eighty percent of total costs come from wage costs and the contractor with the low bid is likely to be the one that pays the lowest wage. The more rapid adjustment of labor to the ebb and tide of business may save business costs, but much of the savings appears to be more from lower wages and higher unemployment costs for both workers and the government than to productivity changes for outsourced work.

Waste Management and Remediation Services

The second part of this sector is simple. It is trash. We can be confidant people at waste management firms are not talkin’ trash, but otherwise they are collecting, hauling and dumping trash. Some of the trash is ordinary trash and some of the trash is hazardous trash. Firms also do trash disposal or trash disposal with treatment. Disposal is storing trash in a landfill, or burning trash in a combustor, or incinerator. Treatment is remediation, which is sorting for recycling, or cleanup of contaminated sites, soil or groundwater. Establishments in this sub sector do septic pumping or rent portable toilets. Employment in waste management and remediation services has continued to grow at an annual rate of 2.39 percent since 1990, a rate more than double the national establishment average. The employed first topped 300 thousand in 1999, topped 400 thousand in 2016 and passed 500 thousand in 2023.

The occupations here tend to be outdoors and involve some measure of physical labor as defined in the Standard Occupational Classification. They are materials moving workers including their supervisors that make up a little over 28.3 percent of jobs. Almost 19.3 percent of jobs are classified as motor vehicle operators including their supervisors. Occupations in office administration have a little over 10 percent of jobs; management and finance occupations have a little under 10 percent of the jobs. Outside of management few jobs need college degree training.

With a 134.453 million service jobs to divvy up, administrative support and waste management and remediation services employment gives us 9.457 million jobs, but that is only 6.1 percent of establishment employment.  Administrative support and waste management and remediation service employment has growth rates higher than the national rate. We have to expect a relative increase in administrative support and waste management in national employment. We only have 4 sectors left to go, but 28.177 million service jobs left to fill.