Increasing payroll
Nationally, STEM workers as a whole earn roughly 70 percent more than the national average, according to 2005 data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The median annual earnings for high school graduates in the United State in 2006 was $26,123. Kentucky workers with a high school diploma earned even less: $24,344 in a year. At the same time, the national average earnings for all STEM-based occupations was $64,360, a difference of $38,237.
Using these national average earnings for comparison, under Lexington's current payroll tax rate of 2.25 percent, the average STEM worker would pay $1,448.10 annually in local payroll taxes alone, or $860.33 more annually than the average high school graduate.
Growing demand
STEM fields are projected to experience healthy growth nationally between 2004 and 2014, with total STEM employment increasing 22 percent nationwide and more than 2.5 million job openings expected due to growth and net replacement. Employment for engineers in the Bluegrass area is expected to grow by 4.1 percent between 2004 and 2014, from 3,752 to 3,905, with 123 average annual job openings.
Employment for computer and mathematical occupations in the Bluegrass area is expected to grow 24.8 percent between 2004 and 2014, from 7,684 to 9,588, with 291 average annual job openings, according to the Kentucky Education Cabinet's Department for Workforce Investment.
Falling supply
As demand for STEM-trained employees in Kentucky and across the country increases, Kentucky's production of the trained workforce to fill those openings is among the lowest in the nation, according to the findings of the Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education's STEM Task Force.
Between 1997-98 and 2004-05, only 923 additional bachelor's degrees, master's degrees and doctoral degrees in STEM disciplines were awarded by Kentucky's eight public and 19 independent institutions.
Kentucky ranks 49th nationally in the number of bachelor's degrees conferred in science and engineering, with 4.75 awarded per 1,000 as compared to 7.82 per 1,000 nationally in 2003. Also, the state ranked 48th in the percentage of degrees conferred in science and engineering as opposed to all other fields, with 22.7 percent in Kentucky as compared to 29.7 percent nationwide.
Statewide educational attainment benefit
Studies in recent years indicate that a lack of knowledge is holding Kentucky back economically.
Research by Kenneth Troske and Kenneth Sanford of the UK Center for Business and Economic Research, for instance, has concluded that a lack of knowledge capital, including the low number of patents per capita and percent of college and high school graduates in the state, is the most influential factor in Kentucky's low incomes and overall slow growth rate. Their conclusions were confirmed by the Kentucky Long-Term Policy Research Center, which estimated that increasing Kentucky's educational attainment levels overall to the U.S. average by the year 2020 could boost state revenue by $5.3 billion and increase personal income by $71 billion.