The exposure of employment in Spain to the US: key sectors and characteristics
Although the exposure of Spanish employment to US demand is limited in aggregate terms, its impact varies considerably from sector to sector. Activities such as manufacturing (especially in pharmaceuticals), air transportation, professional activities and ICT have closer links, together with the sale and repair of vehicles.
The US president’s trade policy, characterised by its apparent unpredictability and protectionist shift, is a source of concern due to its potential impact on our economy. In the article «Tariff tensions and reconfiguration of trade flows: impact on Spain», published in the latest CaixaBank Research Sectoral Observatory, we analyse the Spanish economy’s degree of exposure to the US, both in terms of economic activity and employment, among other exercises. In this article we delve deeper into the analysis of the exposure, in terms of employment, to trade with the US.
According to OECD data, in 2019, 2.2% of employment in Spain was linked to final US demand, a relatively low figure considering that 11.5% depended on demand from the EU and 11.6% on that of the rest of the world.1 Exposure to the US, although limited, varies widely depending on the sector in question (see first chart).
- 1. The latest available data is from 2020, but given the impact of the pandemic, we choose to show the figures for 2019.
Among the most exposed, of particular note is the mining and quarrying sector, which is highly export-oriented and has 5.1% of its employment dependant on US demand. It is closely followed by the information and communications sector (4.2%), professional, scientific and technical activities (4.1%), manufacturing (4%) and transportation and storage (3.7%).
Within the manufacturing sector, the most exposed branch is the pharmaceutical sector: 8.2% of its employment depends on US demand. That is a high figure. Next in the ranking is the other non-metallic mineral products industry (6.3%), while the exposure of motor vehicle manufacturing (including trailers and semi-trailers) is less pronounced: it occupies 12th place among the most exposed manufacturing sectors, with 4.2% of its employment linked to the US, close to the 4.3% recorded by other transport equipment manufacturing.
Within the information and communications sector, employment in programming, consultancy and information services is the most exposed (4.8%). Within the transportation sector, meanwhile, air transportation stands out, given the US’ distance and its key role in tourism: 7.6% employment in this sector depends directly on the US market.
Next, we will analyse the employment of the sectors that have the closest ties to trade with the US. We will look, on the one hand, at the three sectors that are most exposed in terms of employment in absolute terms: the sale and repair of vehicles, the manufacturing industry and professional, scientific and technical activities. On the other hand, we will also look at the information and communications and the transport sectors, due to the significant portion of their total employment that is exposed to the US (see table).2 As far as the characteristics are concerned, we will focus on the recent developments and trends in employment in these sectors, both in terms of wages and in the temporary employment rate, the latter being an indicator of job stability.
- 2. We leave the mining and quarrying industry out of the analysis, even though it is the sector with the highest percentage of employment exposed, because in absolute terms it accounts for only a very small number of jobs.
We will focus first on recent developments and trends. In April 2025, the five sectors mentioned represented 42.6% of the total number of Social Security affiliates, with the sale and repair of vehicles being the most representative (accounting for almost 40% of the total of these five sectors).3 However, their contribution to employment growth since April 2019 has been lower, at 36.6%, meaning that their role in the economy’s total employment has declined as a whole over the past five years. There are differences between these five sectors, however. Employment growth in this period has been well below average (14.0%) in the sale and repair of vehicles and in manufacturing, so both have seen their share of the total decline (see second chart). However, within industry, the pharmaceutical sector stands out, having recorded employment growth of 25%. In contrast, transportation and, above all, professional activities and information and communications have been among the most dynamic, with cumulative employment growth since April 2019 in excess of 20%. As a result, their share of the total employment has increased: the acceleration of digitalisation and the technological transformation after the pandemic has boosted the demand for highly-qualified services, such as consulting, engineering, R&D, etc.
- 3. General Scheme and Special Scheme for Self-Employed Workers (RETA).
In terms of wages, at the 2024 year end, transportation and, in particular, the sale and repair of vehicles were below the all-sector average (see third chart). In contrast, manufacturing and, most notably, professional activities and information and communications were above the average. If we go into the detail by sub-sector, the latest data are those from the annual labour cost survey conducted by Spain’s National Statistics Institute (INE), available up until 2023. According to those data, wage costs in the pharmaceutical manufacturing sector – the one most exposed to trade with the US – were 72.2% above the average for all sectors, while in the case of air transportation they were 59.4% above the average.
In terms of job stability, all five sectors have a temporary employment rate well below the average: of the total number of workers registered with Social Security under the General Scheme in April this year, less than 7.0% were temporary workers in all five cases (this is also the case in the pharmaceutical industry, where the figure stands at 4.2%). This contrasts with a temporary employment rate of 11.8% for the economy as a whole (see fourth chart).
In short, although the exposure of Spanish employment to US demand is limited in aggregate terms, its impact varies from sector to sector. Some, such as manufacturing – particularly the pharmaceutical sector – as well as air transportation, professional activities, information and communications and the sale and repair of vehicles, stand out for their close ties to the US market. These sectors, with the exception of the sale and repair of vehicles, combine a low temporary rate with high wages. This concentration in sectors with higher wages and greater job stability suggests that employment in these sectors may be less sensitive to temporary shocks, such as spikes in uncertainty resulting from the tariff conflict. However, the final impact on employment will depend on the persistence of the shock and on each sector’s capacity to adapt to the new situation in the event of a more pronounced decoupling from the US economy.
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