The paper aimed to analyze the evolution of the population occupied in tourism compared to the population occupied in the national economy in the period 2007-2015 using the empirical data provided by National Institute of Statistics. Index method, comparison method, descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation coefficient, linear regression function, and Herfindhal-Hirschman and Gini-Struck indices were used as methodological framework. The population occupied in tourism activities increased by

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... 2.02 % from 155.5 thousand persons in 2007 to 174.2 thousand persons in 2015. Tourism contributes by 2.07 % to the population occupied in the economy. The Bucharest-Ilfov, Centre and SE micro-regions have the highest number of population working in tourism: 21.19%, 16.07%, and respectively 12.45%. The South West Oltenia and West micro-regions have the lowest shares of population employed in tourism. The persons working in tourism are relatively uniform distributed in the territory as confirmed by Herfindhal-Hirschman and Gini-Struck indices. The tourism structure by professional status is: 90.8 % employees, 3.8 % employers and 5.4 % self employed people, higher figures than in the national economy. Tourism absorbed more younger persons than in the national economy. About 13.5 % of the employed persons in tourism belong to the 15-24 years category and 34.5 % belong to the 25-34 years category. The correlation coefficient r=0.588 between the number of people employed in tourism and the number of units for tourists' accommodation reflects that a higher number of tourists will require a larger accommodation capacity and more employment in tourism activities. The correlation coefficient r=0.355 between the number of places (beds) and the number of persons occupied in tourism is a weak. As a final conclusion, tourism is a dynamic branch of Romania's economy with a high potential to create jobs, employ young people and also women.