Are Technical Illustrator job opportunities growing or declining?

Are jobs in this industry on the rise? Are there any sub-sectors that are growing?

Where are the jobs? Which places have the most Technical Illustrator opportunities?

Declining for sure. It's much more competitive now than it used to be. You could get by just knowing how to trace photos in adobe illustrator, call yourself an illustrator and make 20 bucks an hour. Now the chinese are doing it for 2.50 and hour. It's tough to find good companies to work for but they are out there. I wouldn't try to get a job in the auto industry. Have a specialty helps, I focused on one aspect of technical illustration and tried to excel in that.

clint ford in denver, Colorado said: Declining for sure. It's much more competitive now than it used to be. You could get by just knowing how to trace photos in adobe illustrator, call yourself an illustrator and make 20 bucks an hour. Now the chinese are doing it for 2.50 and hour. It's tough to find good companies to work for but they are out there. I wouldn't try to get a job in the auto industry. Have a specialty helps, I focused on one aspect of technical illustration and tried to excel in that.

Most definitely declining. The aerospace industry which used to employ thousands of technical illustrators is now globally outsourcing a large percentage of their commercial work overseas to places like Puerto Rico, Chili & Mexico. The labor is so cheap contracting companies here in the states can't compete. So I wouldn't suggest the aerospace industry either. Military work is insulated against cheap overseas labor so there is less competition.

I agree, declining.

Sad to say. I worked for a high tech, cutting edge, yeild management semiconductor company in Silicon Valley. My job was out sourced to India.
One aspect that upsets me was that I helped train what would become my replacement. I was lead to understand they would be coworkers.
Now 60, and 6 years to retirement, I am unemployeed for the first time in my life.
I love what I do and would continue for the rest of my life, but who knows.
Reference; www.2ndstring1st.com/HTML/Resume/resume.html
Take a look at the portfolio to see what kind of work I was doing.

Robert ... sadly your story is all too common. I have worked in technical publications, primarily illustration, for the past 35 years. The majority of that time (29 years) was spent with two different companies. However, over the past 5 years I have worked for four different companies and in my current position I am doing technical writing ... not illustration. Two of my former coworkers were also tasked with training illustrators in Chili that will eventually replace them. I am 56 years old and my recent 100-day unemployment adventure was my third layoff over the past 6 years. I looked over your portfolio and it is very impressive. Many say that full-time freelance is the way to go and maybe that's true. However, while I consider myself an accomplished illustrator ... I do not consider myself a good salesman. Good Luck & God Bless.
Gary

We've started a new site for Technical Illustrators to network with each other and exchange tips and ideas. Have a look.
technicalillustrators.org