Nov. 1, 2021—TechForce Foundation’s annual Technician Supply and Demand Report has found that more than 175,000 new entrant automotive technician positions are needed in 2021.
Roughly 97 percent of those openings are classified as “replacement positions” which are created by retirement, transfers or turnover. The other three percent make up new positions that are being created.
It’s a significant increase from previous projections, which forecasted roughly 78,000 jobs would need to be filled. The increase comes as a result of roughly 53,000 lost technician jobs in 2020 along with a lack of hiring that occurred over the past 12 months.
The report states: “should that high demand be filled from 2021 to 2022, it is expected that the demand will then level out, much in-line with previous projections. However, it is considered very unlikely that it will be possible to fill such a large number of positions within a one-year period. The odds are that a significant number of unfilled carryover positions will remain. That being the case, our 2022 report will quite likely show that demand has not yet leveled off, and that unfilled demand will then raise the number of open positions again from 2022 to 2023.”
