10 U.S. states have now legalized the recreational use of marijuana while another 34 have given it the green light for medicinal use. That has resulted in a noticeable boost in the American job market and it's estimated that 211,000 people are now directly employed in the industry full time. Counting indirect and induced jobs depending on legal marijuana, that number rises to 296,000. By comparison, the U.S. has 69,000 brewing workers while 52,000 people are employed in coal mining jobs. That's according to a new report from marijuana website Leafly which describes the employment trend in the sector as "America's hidden job boom".
The Bureau of Labor Statistics refuses to count or report job gains in marijuana because it is remains illegal at federal level and that makes Leafly's findings all the more important. The U.S. added 64,389 full time marijuana jobs in 2018, a 44% increase on the previous year, making it the fastest growing job sector in the country right now. Given that the legal marijuana industry is worth more than $10 billion a year, which states are recording the highest rates of job growth?
The research found that Florida added the most new jobs in 2018 with 9,068 while Pennsylvania experienced the largest percentage increase - 4,208%. At the beginning of 2018, only 90 people were employed in the sector in Pennsylvania and by January of 2019, that had increased to 3,878. California has been a trailblazer for the industry but it suffered upheavals in 2018 as it transitioned from an unregulated medical market to regulated medical which resulted in a dip in its total legal market size. The Golden State is still expected to rebound in 2019 and add at least 9,500 new jobs. Nationwide, the U.S. is projected to experience a 110% gain in marijuana jobs from 2017 to 2020.
*Click below to enlarge (charted by Statista)
