Let's face it, the job market in Tampa Bay is horrible. The unemployment rate in the area is still around 11%, two percentage points above the national average. College graduates from USF, UT, The Art Institute of Tampa, Southwest Florida College and other local schools are struggling to get into the market. Most of those that have been fortunate to find jobs in Tampa are receiving lower incomes than what those jobs earned a few years ago.

With all the news about the bad economy and high unemployment rate, it is discouraging and hard to find jobs. For those that are employed, here are 5 things you can do to save your job and for those that are unemployed, hate their job or feel they deserve more money, start searching for jobs in Tampa.

Despite facts that companies are continuing to downsize, freezing budgets or going under, there are still companies in Tampa Bay that are hiring. Total non-farm payrolls in the Tampa-St Petersburg-Clearwater area have gone up year over year more than 1%. Leisure and hospitality jobs lead that incline with a 6% increase followed by financial jobs with more than a 3% increase in payrolls.

So if more companies are hiring in Tampa, where are they?

Savtira - Located in Ybor City, Savtira is a rapidly growing eCommerce company that we reported hiring over 265 workers. With the booming demand for Cloud computing technologies, Savtira is certainly going to continue seeing growth and bring more technology invested dollars into our local economy.

Raymond James Financial - Check out their career section because Raymond James has several job openings that include Account Managers, Marketing Coordinators, Software Engineers and Analysts. They also have Student Opportunities for college students and recent graduates. Here is a list of jobs at Raymond James

Citigroup - Another financial firm in the Tampa Bay area that is hiring. Their Tampa headquarters is located in the East Tampa / Brandon area off the Martin Luther King Jr exit of I-75. Jobs posted on their website include Analysts, Financial Representatives and a couple IT related jobs.

Humana and UnitedHealth Group are both hiring in the Tampa Bay area. The jobs at UnitedHealth Group are posted on this jobs section.

CrowdSavings.com - Located in Downtown Tampa, CrowdSavings is a fast growing Daily Deals site based here in Tampa. Although most of their jobs are in markets they are expanding to, according to their website, they have some jobs available here in town.

There are some upcoming job fairs, but the most unique of them is the Big East Virtual Career Fair being held between November 1-3, 2011.

If you know of any companies that are hiring in Tampa Bay, leave a comment below or send an email to pr@myareanetwork.com.