The Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission is an interstate, intercounty and intercity agency that provides comprehensive and coordinated planning for the orderly growth of the Delaware Valley region. As the region's metropolitan planning organization (MPO), the Commission provides technical assistance and services to its member state and local governments, the private sector and the public. Delaware Valley Data is our periodic series of free data bulletins and analytical reports.

This data bulletin provides estimates of the number of employed persons by type and sector for each county in an expanded four-state, twenty-eight county area. These counties include the city of Philadelphia and its surrounding eight counties that comprise the core DVRPC region, as well as nineteen additional counties that constitute the Commission's data services area.

Regional Economic Information System
This employment data was compiled from estimates derived by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA). The BEA data, which is released yearly, provides an estimate of full and part-time employment located within a county by type and sector. These yearly releases are known as the Regional Economic Information System (REIS).

Since these yearly tabulations are estimates, they contain data for the most current years as well as revisions to previous releases. The BEA data may be revised for several years following release. Users are cautioned that this data may not agree with previous releases due to retro-adjustment. Years included in this bulletin include 1970, 73, 75 and 78; 1980, 83,85 and 88; 1990, 93,95 and 98 as well as 2000, the most recently released year in the REIS data-set.

Estimates are first broken into Wage/Salary and Proprietor employment as well as Farm and Non-farm employment. Non-farm employment is broken into Public and Private sectors, and the Private sector estimates are further broken into Agriculture Services, Mining, Construction, Manufacturing, Transportation/Public Utilities, Wholesale Trade, Retail Trade, Finance/Insurance/Real Estate, and Services. See the extensive Appendix 1 for specific county level employment estimates for each of these categories and each county within our expanded region.

DVRPC 9-County Core Region
In addition to providing the data, this bulletin calculates percent and absolute change for various groupings of the counties in our region. The DVRPC core region includes the five Pennsylvania counties of Bucks, Chester, Delaware, Montgomery and Philadelphia and the four New Jersey counties of Burlington, Camden, Gloucester and Mercer.

Table 1 and Figure 1 illustrate employment change by county for the 9-counties in the core DVRPC region. Figure 2 and Figure 3 illustrate employment percentages by related sectors for the aggregate DVRPC 9-county core region for the years 1970 and 2000. Table 1 and Figure 1 indicate that all counties in the 9-county region except Philadelphia have experienced employment growth over the past three decades. However, the rate of growth peaked for most of the region in the 1980's. Additionally Philadelphia's job decline dropped from 17% in the 1970's to 3% in the 1980's. The data also illustrates that the region, including Philadelphia, experienced a greater degree of job growth in the 1980's economic expansion than in the 1990's.

Figures 2 and 3 indicate the percentage of jobs in related sectors at the beginning and the end of the period from 1970 to 2000. The switch from manufacturing and construction jobs to professional and financial services is evident in these figures. In 1970, 30% of the region's jobs were in manufacturing and construction. By 2000 only 15% of the region's jobs were in these same sectors. Additionally, in 1970 Professional and Financial Service comprised 28% of the region's employment but by 2000 these services were the leading sectors providing almost half of the jobs in the 9-county region.

DVRPC 28-County Data Services Area
Table 2, Table 3, Figure 4 and Figure 5 illustrate employment change for the expanded 28-county DVRPC data services area. The DVRPC extended data services area includes Kent and New Castle counties in Delaware; Cecil and Harford counties in Maryland; Atlantic, Burlington, Camden, Cape May, Cumberland, Gloucester, Hunterdon, Mercer, Middlesex, Monmouth, Ocean, Salem, Somerset, and Warren counties in New Jersey; and Berks, Bucks, Chester, Delaware, Lancaster, Lehigh, Montgomery, Northhampton, Philadelphia, and York counties in Pennsylvania. Table 2 provides employment change from 1990 to 2000 for these counties. Figure 4 compares employment change in Philadelphia County to its suburbs(the other 8 counties in the DVRPC 9-county core region) and the DVRPC 8-county suburbs to the greater 4-state region.

Table 2 and Figure 4 are similar to Table 1 and Figure 1. They indicate that Philadelphia is experiencing employment loss while the surrounding counties are experiencing employment growth. Additionally, beyond Philadelphia, there is little difference between the counties surrounding the 9-county region and those within it. Counties beyond the region's 9-county core in the aggregate expanded their employment base by only 1% more in each of the past three decades. The 1980's was again the decade of the greatest expansion, with 29% employment growth in the outer counties of the data service area and a 28% employment growth rate for the 8 mostly suburban counties surrounding Philadelphia. Notable exceptions occurred in Southern New Jersey. The predominately rural county of Salem was the only other county besides Philadelphia to lose jobs, but at a rate of 2% in the 1980's and 1990's. The areas of greatest growth were also in New Jersey. Atlantic and Ocean counties employment grew by 48% and Hunterdon's by a phenomenal 61% in the 1980's. In the 1990's only Chester County, Pennsylvania came close to that rate, with a 32% increase in employment between 1990 and 2000.

Finally, since all 28 counties in the DVRPC data services region are considered part of some Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) defined by the Census Bureau, Figure 5 compares employment change from 1990 to 2000 by the metropolitan areas predominately contained within the DVRPC 28-county data services area, and Table 3 indicates within which metropolitan statistical area each county in the data services area resides. In the past decade the Atlantic/Cape May Metropolitan area was the urban area with the greatest level of job creation.

Appendix: Employment, by County, by Sector, by Year [.xls| 190 KB]

Data bulletin #74 is one of a series of bulletins designed to disseminate information to member state, county and local governments and other interested parties. For more information on Data Bulletins and Analytical Data Reports, please visit the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission's website (www.dvrpc.org) or contact DVRPC at the telephone number below.

The Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission was established in 1965 by interstate compact between Pennsylvania and New Jersey to plan for the orderly growth and development of the region, and to provide a variety of planning and technical assistance services responding to regional issues. DVRPC maintains a significant database for twenty-eight counties encompassing New Jersey, Delaware, Pennsylvania and Maryland. Included in the database are data profiles at the regional, county and municipal level and for other census geography as requested. DVRPC produces a diverse range of services, including demographic and economic data and projections; mapping and aerial photography; computer assisted mapping; geographic information systems; impact studies; and policy and program development.

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