As discuss of a recession mounts, analysts are scrutinizing all financial indicators for indicators of a slowdown. Job postings are a great indicator to keep watch over as they’re up to date every day and are a number one indicator of employment developments as corporations don’t submit job vacancies until they anticipate demand for his or her items and providers to proceed to develop.
Chmura’s real-time job postings confirmed a slight slowdown in Virginia job postings over the past week of Might, however no sharp decline. In truth, new on-line job advert quantity peaked within the first quarter of 2022 at 334,567 adverts. This surpassed the earlier post-COVID peak that occurred in Q2 2021 at 301,589. New job adverts hit a low of 200,624 within the second quarter of 2020 as lockdowns had been first launched as a result of pandemic.
The latest surge in job postings has been significantly sturdy for white collar jobs in Virginia and throughout the nation. After the drop in job listings that coincided with the preliminary COVID lockdowns, blue collar jobs recovered the quickest, partially as a result of elevated demand for transportation and materials dealing with jobs. Because the starting of 2020, workplace and repair sector occupations lastly appear to be catching up when it comes to relative development in new job commercials. Some workplace jobs with a very high quantity of vacancies in early 2022 are Registered Nurses, Software Engineers and Secretaries.
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Apart from the continued enhance in job commercials, the extra fascinating pattern is the rise in wages and entry-level bonuses in some occupations, reflecting ongoing tightening within the labor market. Wages in 2021 took a big leap in Virginia and throughout the nation, particularly in lower-paying jobs. This pattern has continued into early 2022. Outstanding jobs with below-average wages have been tough to fill and have seen a commensurate enhance in pay as employers search to fill these positions. Wages reported in job commercials point out double-digit proportion will increase for these positions, which embody many positions in hospitality (meals prep employees, waiters and waitresses, and cooks) and retail positions.
The observe of providing sign-up bonuses in Virginia stays high, an indication of an ongoing tight job market. About 1.7% of all new job commercials in January 2020 explicitly talked about a sign-up bonus. This observe has turn into more and more well-liked within the second half of 2020. As of January 2021, 2.5% of all Virginia job listings included signup bonuses, which elevated to five.4% in April 2022.
Entry bonuses have all the time been and proceed to be well-liked with blue-collar occupations equivalent to truck drivers. Fourteen % of all April 2022 employee adverts in Virginia talked about a sign-up bonus. This profit has additionally elevated for some service and white-collar jobs, however the percentages are a lot decrease at 5.3% and three.8%, respectively.
Christine Chmura is CEO and Chief Economist at Chmura Economics & Analytics. She may be reached at (804) 649-3640 or by electronic mail at chris@chmuraecon.com.