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The share of women in the workforce increased dramatically over the second half of the 20th century, nationally and in the Seattle area. In 1950, women were less than one-third of all workers in our metro area. By 2000, the share of women was nearly half.
Since then, the share of women in the workforce has plateaued. In 2023, it was 47% in the Seattle area, about the same as it was in 2000, according to census data.
Something has changed since 2000: The gender balance across many occupations has shifted. The representation of women has increased dramatically in some jobs and declined in others. Census data reveals which occupations stand out in the Seattle area.
You might think the occupation where women made the largest inroads was one that’s historically been male-dominated, such as technology. But that was not the case.
Among the 100 most common occupations in the Seattle metro, the biggest increase in female representation was in a job that was already majority women: Human resources managers.
In 2000, women made up about 57% of the 6,400 human resources managers in the Seattle metro. Since then, the share of women has jumped 16 percentage points, to 73% in 2023.
The data gives us a clue why this might have happened. In 2000, a big gender gap existed between managerial and nonmanagerial roles in the human resources field — 69% of workers in nonmanagerial positions were women, compared with 57% of people in managerial roles. Since then, it would seem, a lot more women got promoted into managerial jobs in the human resources field, shrinking the gap with nonmanagerial positions.
Unlike human resources managers, the job with the second largest increase in female representation had been predominantly male in 2000: Physicians and surgeons. The share of women in this job category in the Seattle area rose by about 12 percentage points, from 33% in 2000 to 45% in 2023. That change isn’t surprising given that women now make up the majority of students in U.S. medical schools, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges.
Architecture was also an overwhelmingly male profession in 2000 in the Seattle area, but since then, architecture has seen the third largest increase in female representation among the most common occupations in our metro. While men are still in the majority, women increased as the share of local architects from 27% in 2000 to 39% in 2023.
At the same time, some jobs have become a lot more male since 2000.
Sales representatives for services, such as insurance, advertising and financial services, had the biggest increase in male representation among the 100 most common occupations in the Seattle area. The share of men in this occupation increased from 61% to 70%, a 9 percentage point jump.
Two other occupations had similar 9 percentage point increases in the share of employees who were male: Food preparation workers and teachers who work outside the standard public-school system, such as in private schools, vocational schools and learning centers.
Among the 100 most common occupations in our area, the job that skews most female was preschool and kindergarten teachers. Women made up 95% of those employed in this field in 2023, barely changed from 96% in 2000.
The most male-skewed job in 2023 in the Seattle area was automotive service technicians and mechanics, at around 99% — that’s up slightly from 97% in 2000.
You may be wondering about the shift in the gender balance of software developers, the most common job in the Seattle area.
In 2023, about 132,600 software developers were in our metro area, and just 20% were women. That’s a slightly lower estimate than in 2000, when 22% were women. At that point, only about 24,300 software developers in total were in the Seattle metro.
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