Mobile technology is not only impacting how people and organizations work, it’s also beginning to impact the U.S. economy in new and not-altogether-surprising ways.

A new report from Recon Analytics, presented by Roger Entner at an event last month hosted by the Progressive Policy Institute, highlighted some of the significant ways the U.S. wireless industry is changing the nation’s economic landscape, and in turn, is adding momentum to adoption of mobile technology in the workplace.

The wireless industry, as a whole, is now larger in size than a variety of mainstream industries in America, including agriculture, motor vehicle manufacturing, hotels and lodging, air transportation, and motion picture and recording, observes Jot Carpenter, an executive with CTIA, the international trade group representing the wireless communications industry.

Those who still scan a newspaper, or who pay attention to television and online ads probably won’t be surprised either that telecom is now the second largest advertising category in the U.S., notes Carpenter.

But even Carpenter, who heads up CTIA’s and the wireless industry’s outreach efforts to members of Congress and government agencies, found several aspects of the Entner’s report particularly impressive, including the facts that:

• Wireless drove $33 billion in productivity improvements in 2011; over the next 10 years, these efficiency gains will grow to more than $1.4 trillion.
• Wireless enabled an entirely new business, the “app” economy, to grow from zero to $10 billion in four years.
• Wireless directly or indirectly supports 3.8 million jobs, or 2.6% of all U.S. employment.
• The wireless industry pays wages that are 65% higher than the national average.
• Wireless contributes $195.5 billion to the U.S. GDP.

Perhaps more impressive are how the impact of wireless is likely to grow in the future, especially if an additional 500 MHz of spectrum is made available for commercial use by 2020, as the FCC proposed in its 2010 National Broadband Plan. According to Entner’s projections, that would result in:

• An increase of $13.1 billion in wireless applications and content sales.
• A boost of $36.7 billion in government revenues
• An additional 350,000 new U.S. jobs.
• An increase of $166 billion in U.S. GDP.

Carpenter of course has a full-time job and then some trying to wrestle more of the wireless spectrum into the private sector’s clutches, where, many argue it could be put to more productive use.

Given the dramatic rise of wireless data usage in the U.S., Carpenter and those he represents have reason to be concerned. The U.S., for instance, trails many developed countries when it comes to much how much spectrum is available and what’s in the pipeline for commercial use, according to a chart he shared on a recent blog post.

The growing gap between wireless supply and demand was the subject of a recent CNN Money video.

While new ways to increase wireless capacity are in the works, there remains much to be done to meet the FCC’s National Broadband Plan‘s spectrum goals.

That’s not to mention the rising expectations of the public, as well the growing demands of organizations to support an increasingly mobile workforce and customer base.