The economy added enough technology jobs in April to gain back the number lost in March, and then some.

U.S. employment numbers released last week by the Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics found despite continued volatility in many IT employment segments, the largest net monthly job gain in IT-related jobs recorded since the Wall Street financial crisis was realized in April, IT labor market research firm Foote Partners reported. A net gain of 8,800 such jobs represented a 15,600-job swing following a brief March 2010 setback in which 6,800 jobs were lost overall in the five bellwether IT job segments monitored in the BLS data.

Foote Partners' David Foote recently told us IT leaders are moving to an employment model that relies more on specialized contractors than expert full-timers. Though April's numbers are good, he told eWeek today's tech-labor market is "somewhat unique, with the number of jobs and salaries stabilizing even though pay and demand for specific skills can swing "wildly up and down within windows as short as three months." He sees that as being "clearly" due to "other factors than the recession at work here."

-- Mark Feffer