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Brad Olsen: Infometrics Principal Economist on job ads declining for the third consecutive month · The SME Stream

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Now job ads have fallen for three months in a row.
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  Speaker 1: There is hope that this might actually be the end
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  Speaker 1: of the thing. We might be seeing a bottoming out here.
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  Speaker 1: And Brad Awson is Informetrix principle economists.
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  Speaker 2: Hey, Brad, good evening.
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  Speaker 1: What makes you think we're seeing light at the end
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  Speaker 1: of the tunnel here?
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  Speaker 2: Well, I mean, things do seem like they might be
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  Speaker 2: stabilizing a touch. Some of the fools in the last
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: couple of months haven't been as huge as what they
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  Speaker 2: were if you go back to sort of earlier in
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  Speaker 2: twenty twenty four, and so when you look at the
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  Speaker 2: latest SEEK data, it does seem to suggest again maybe
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  Speaker 2: a little bit of that bottoming out or stabilization. To
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  Speaker 2: be fair, it's at very low levels. I mean, the
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  Speaker 2: number of job ads out there in the market at
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  Speaker 2: the moment the lowest since May twenty thirteen on my calculations,
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  Speaker 2: excluding that big hit from the lockdown. So you know,
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: it might be stabilizing, but it's stabilizing very very low.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, what do you make of the fact that there's
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  Speaker 1: been a bounce up in Wellington?
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  Speaker 2: There are some odd figures looking through here, Heather, and
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  Speaker 2: it's sort of you know, does make you under but
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  Speaker 2: if there are parts of the economy that are perhaps
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  Speaker 2: doing better than we give them credit for, I mean,
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  Speaker 2: the likes of that Wellington increase a little bit surprise
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  Speaker 2: and giving a lot of the doom and gloom. The
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  Speaker 2: other one that really surprised me was the fact that
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  Speaker 2: job ads in government and defense have lifted for the
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  Speaker 2: last two months. In fact, they are up fifteen percent
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  Speaker 2: month on month in October, so PEPs things maybe not
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  Speaker 2: quite as bad. Also, I think probably highlighting that in
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  Speaker 2: government there has been a lot of change, perhaps a
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  Speaker 2: lot of people that have lost their jobs, and maybe
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  Speaker 2: now government departments trying to rehire in a few areas
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  Speaker 2: where they realize that they need a little bit more capacity.
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  Speaker 2: Long story short, this is still not great news for
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  Speaker 2: the economy. Job numbers are still down, job ads are
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  Speaker 2: still down, and a lot of people are putting in
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  Speaker 2: applications for what are fewer and fewer opportunities. But again
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  Speaker 2: maybe a little bit of that turning point starting to
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  Speaker 2: become clearer in the numbers, which might be again reinforcing
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  Speaker 2: that view of greener shoots next year.
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  Speaker 1: Now, apart from obviously government and defense, which are the
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  Speaker 1: two places in Wellington that are hiring. What else is?
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  Speaker 1: What other sector is are we talking about here?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean in the latest month, so this is
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  Speaker 2: October data. The biggest sort of gain was for banking
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  Speaker 2: and financial services up eighteen percent month on month, and
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  Speaker 2: a few more again changes around to the likes of
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  Speaker 2: design and architecture, call centers, hospitality. So again maybe just
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  Speaker 2: some of those areas that possibly got hit a bit
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  Speaker 2: harder at the start that are now turning around the
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  Speaker 2: other side. When we've looked at activity compared to say
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  Speaker 2: a year ago, some of the areas that are least
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  Speaker 2: hit are the likes of banking, design, legal and farming.
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  Speaker 2: The worst hit though again probably of no surprise, the
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  Speaker 2: likes of advertising rolls down about fifty three percent year
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  Speaker 2: on year, consulting in strategy down thirty seven percent, and
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  Speaker 2: admin rolls down thirty five So business is still being
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  Speaker 2: a lot tighter on how much money they're willing to
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  Speaker 2: put out in the economy. But again maybe signs that
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  Speaker 2: things aren't continuing to get as much worse and perhaps
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  Speaker 2: than that turning point starting to come around.
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  Speaker 1: Brad, it's good to talk to you mate, Thank you
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  Speaker 1: so much. It's brad Olsen, principal economic economist for Matrix