Job Market11/08/2022 · 3 min
Every Tuesday, Textkernel provides an update about international job markets. With Jobfeed data, they are able to pinpoint exactly how the state of the job market is during the pandemic and how the COVID-19 crisis impacts the job market.
Over the past few weeks, we’ve seen vacancies disappear in every area of the world.
Though some countries coped significantly better than others, over the past few weeks, we’ve seen vacancies disappear in every area of the world. In second week of April, the United Kingdom registered a record low of 20% in total amount of new vacancies. Essentially meaning that 80% of all new vacancies had vanished. While Spain is known for being tourism-based, which usually results in a poor job market up until Easter, they are also among the hardest hit by the COVID-19 crisis.
UK’s struggles continue
Last week we reported how the UK’s Office for Budget Responsibility expects the unemployment to soar by more than 2 million, and the economy to shrink by 35%. And as Andrew Hunter, co-founder of job search engine adzuna.co.uk, predicted, the downward trend looks likely to continue over the next few weeks.
The British economy is on course to decrease by roughly 13% quarterly in the three months up until June.
Meanwhile, a recent Reuters poll of economists have now suggested that the British economy is on course to decrease by roughly 13% quarterly in the three months up until June. KPMG’s vice-chair James Stewart told Reuters that the COVID-19 pandemic will continue to lead to a record drop in vacancies, with recruitment plants continued to be frozen everywhere. “We estimate that as many as 13 million jobs are highly affected by the lockdown, representing just over a third of all jobs in the UK.”
A methodological approach
“While fighting the virus must remain our priority, the strain the lockdown is placing the economy under cannot be sustained indefinitely without very significant and long-lasting effects on unemployment and job creation”, Neil Carberry, Chief Executive of the Recruitment & Employment Confederation (REC), said. Carberry calls upon the UK government to ensure that business see a support approach that tapers out, rather than leaving them to it as soon as the economy returns to normal.
If the post COVID-19 approach isn’t measured and methodological, it may result in organisations having to cut costs quickly.
As Carberry puts it, it will allow organisations to invest in the future, create new jobs, while driving the economy. If the post COVID-19 approach isn’t measured and methodological, it may result in organisations having to cut costs quickly. The only way that’s done, is simply by making more redundancies. And that’s a scenario that must be avoided at all costs.
