Employee Tenure Summary

Technical information:  (202) 691-6378     USDL 04-1829
               http://www.bls.gov/cps/
                                           For release:  10:00 A.M. EDT
Media contact:                691-5902     Tuesday, September 21, 2004


                          EMPLOYEE TENURE IN 2004

   The median number of years that wage and salary workers had been with
their current employer was 4.0 years in January 2004, according to data
released today by the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department
of Labor.  This measure, referred to as employee tenure, was 3.7 years in
January 2002.  Nearly 31 percent of workers age 25 and over had 10 or more
years of tenure with their current employer in January 2004.
   
   Information on employee tenure is obtained from supplemental questions
in the Current Population Survey (CPS).  The CPS is a monthly survey of
about 60,000 households that provides information on the labor force
status, demographics, and other characteristics of the civilian noninsti-
tutional population age 16 and over.  The questions about employee tenure
have been essentially the same since 1983.  Prior to that year, the ques-
tions on employee tenure were significantly different.  As a result, this
release focuses only on comparable data from 1983 to 2004.  (See the Tech-
nical Note.)
   
Demographic Characteristics
   
   Median employee tenure is higher among older workers than younger ones,
as would be expected.  For example, in January 2004, the median tenure of
workers age 55 to 64 (9.6 years) was more than three times that of workers
age 25 to 34 (2.9 years).
   
   In January 2004, median tenure for women (3.8 years) was about 0.3 year
less than that of men (4.1 years).  Prior to 1996, the difference in median
tenure between men and women was about a year.  Beginning in 1996, the dif-
ference has been only about a half year or less.  (See table 1.)
   
   About half of all workers age 45 and over had been with their current
employer for 10 years or more in January 2004.  For workers age 35 to 44,
about one-quarter had such long tenure.  Thirty-two percent of male wage
and salary workers age 25 and over had been with their current employer
for 10 years or more in January 2004, compared with 29 percent of women.
Since January 1983, when the proportions were 38 percent for men and 25
percent for women, the gap between them has narrowed considerably.  (See
table 2.)

                                  - 2 -

   In January 2004, 17 percent of Hispanics or Latinos (age 16 and over)
had been with their current employer for 10 years or more, compared with
27 percent of whites, 23 percent of blacks, and 19 percent of Asians.
(See table 3.)  The shorter tenure among Hispanic or Latino workers can be
explained, in part, by their relative youth.  Among employed Hispanics or
Latinos age 25 years and over, nearly 40 percent were between the ages of
25 and 34, compared with about 25 percent of employed whites and about 30
percent each of employed blacks and Asians.  Moreover, about 1 in 5 employed
Hispanics or Latinos age 16 and over had not been in the United States for
10 years.

   The proportion of wage and salary workers with a year or less of tenure
with their current employer was 23 percent in January 2004.  This short-
tenured group includes new entrants and reentrants to the workforce, job
losers who found new jobs during the previous year, and workers who had
voluntarily changed employers during the previous year.  Also, young work-
ers have shorter tenure than older workers.  For example, almost three-
quarters of 16- to 19-year-olds and about half of 20- to 24-year-olds had
tenure of 12 months or less with their current employer; this compares with
about 1 in 10 workers age 45 and over.
   
Industry
   
   In January 2004, nonagricultural wage and salary workers in the public
sector had nearly double the tenure of their counterparts in private in-
dustries, 6.9 and 3.5 years, respectively.  (See table 5.)  Part of the
gap in tenure is due to the fact that government workers tend to be some-
what older than workers in private industries; nearly 75 percent of govern-
ment workers were age 35 and over, compared with 60 percent of private wage
and salary workers.
   
   Within the private sector, manufacturing workers had the highest me-
dian tenure (5.8 years) of the major industry groups.  Within manufactur-
ing, industries with particularly high employee tenure included petroleum
and coal products (11.4 years), electrical equipment and appliances (9.8
years), beverage and tobacco products (8.0 years), and transportation
equipment (7.7 years).  Across the major industries, median tenure was 
lowest among workers in leisure and hospitality, at 2.0 years.  Again, age
distribution affects overall median tenure; workers in manufacturing tend
to be older than those in leisure and hospitality.
   
Occupation
   
   Workers in management, professional, and related occupations had the
highest median tenure (5.0 years) among the major occupational groups.
Employees in service occupations had the lowest median tenure, 2.8 years.
(See table 6.)  Workers in service occupations tend to be younger than
persons employed in management, professional, and related occupations.
   
   Jobs with noticeably high employee tenure include management occupa-
tions (6.0 years), architecture and engineering occupations (5.8 years),
protective service occupations (5.5 years), education, training, and
library occupations (5.1 years), and production occupations (5.0 years).
Jobs with somewhat low employee tenure include food preparation and serv-
ing related occupations (1.8 years), personal care and service occupations
(2.7 years), sales and related occupations (2.8 years), and healthcare sup-
port occupations (2.9 years).