Yahoo Finance Companies pull out all the stops to fill jobs in a market 'like we have never seen'
This article first appeared in the Morning Brief. Get the Morning Brief sent directly to your inbox every Monday to Friday by 6:30 a.m. ET. Subscribe
Tuesday, August 17, 2021
No skills? No degree? You're hired.
The hiring logjam showed some signs of easing in July.
But companies in the trenches trying to match labor demand and supply still see a market that continues to be imbalanced — and tilted heavily towards those looking for work.
"No matter what source you use right now, fundamentally there [are] 40% more jobs open today than there [were] before the pandemic began," ZipRecruiter CEO Ian Siegel told Yahoo Finance Live on Monday. "And that was already a white hot job market."
As of the end of June, a record 10.1 million jobs were available in the U.S. But as ZipRecruiter (ZIP) said in its second quarter letter to shareholders, the labor market today is one of "disequilibrium."
"What you're looking at right now is an unprecedented reality for job seekers," Siegel added. "If you want work, there is an abundance of it. If you want to make more money, [there is] an abundance of opportunity to find a job that pays you more. This is a job seekers' market like we have never seen."
As of the July jobs report, there were 5.7 million fewer people employed than the pre-pandemic peak of February 2020. And even with some Federal Reserve officials starting to talk more openly about the role retirements might play in preventing the labor market from reaching pre-COVID levels, there are still millions of would-be workers currently on the sidelines.
The nationwide expiration of pandemic unemployment benefits in September could be a catalyst to bring folks back into the workforce. A return to school might also alleviate child care-related absences from the labor market. And, as we've chronicled time and again in this space, large employers with considerable resources continue to ramp up pay and other incentives to meet their employment needs.
And to fill these positions, employers are dropping requirements left and right.
Earlier this summer, we highlighted data from Indeed that showed a rise in the use of phrases like "hiring urgently" and an uptick in jobs advertising sign-on bonuses or other incentives. These are dynamics that ZipRecruiter continues to see predominate on its platform as well.
"Just to give you some perspective on wide [of] a net employers are casting right now, the number of jobs that require either a college degree or five-plus years experience has fallen in half," Siegel said.
"The number of jobs that say 'no experience required' stated in the job description has doubled. Employers are raising wages. They are offering signing bonuses and flexible schedules," he explained. "If there is a secret weapon to attract the right job seekers to your job, no one seems to have cracked the code on it yet."
By Myles Udland, reporter and anchor for Yahoo Finance Live. Follow him at @MylesUdland
Yahoo Finance Highlights
Why one Wall Street strategist is a bitcoin skeptic
Unemployment benefits during the pandemic helped workers more than in the Great Recession
Delta variant could dampen Norwegian Cruise bookings, CEO remains confident
—
Follow Yahoo Finance on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Flipboard, LinkedIn, YouTube, and reddit
