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Mexico: Employment Outlook
2012-04-28
by Going Global
Throughout the recession, Mexico’s unemployment rate remained relatively low from an international perspective, according to the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development). Mexican employers did not massively lay off workers during the recession. But the fiscal crisis is “likely to have translated into workers moving from the formal to the informal sector in Mexico,” according to the OECD. Unemployment in Mexico is currently 5.38 percent and is expected to decline further to 4.5 before year’s end.
The most recent Global Snapshot from international recruiter Antal reports that the Americas region is currently the most active recruiter in the world, with an average of 70 percent of businesses currently hiring managers and professionals. The highest scores came from the US and Mexico, both at 76 percent.
Job creation in Mexico reached a 14-year high of 730,000 last year, slowing the ‘official’ unemployment rate to around 5 percent, according to Kelly Services. The country’s strengthening economy is predicted to create the 800,000 jobs needed to keep pace with the growing labor force by 2012. Kelly also notes while Mexico’s labor costs were 260 percent higher than China’s five years ago, today they are only 14 percent higher than China’s. In the first three month of this year, Mexico created 230,721 new jobs, helping fuel consumer demand.
Manpower, Inc., a global human resources firm, predicts the Mexican labor market’s upbeat hiring pace will continue. In fact, Mexican manufacturers are reporting the strongest hiring intentions since Manpower’s Employment Outlook Survey began in 2002. Among the more than 4,800 Mexican employers surveyed, 23 percent expect to add to their payrolls, 7 percent expect reductions and 70 percent expect no changes to their workforces. In a year-over-year comparison, employers are generally optimistic about hiring.
Employers in Mexico’s manufacturing sector anticipate the strongest job prospects for the quarter ahead, while construction employers posted the strongest year-over-year improvement. Mexican employers continue to be very optimistic on their hiring plans, with more than 20 percent expecting to add to their payrolls, and a high percentage expecting to make no changes to their workforces in the second quarter, according to the Manpower Employment Outlook Survey.
http://www.goinglobal.com/
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