We regularly update this report to track the pandemic’s effects on the labour market.
Growth of Irish job postings on Indeed continues. Job postings — a real-time measure of labour market activity — were 53% above the 1 February, 2020, pre-pandemic baseline, seasonally adjusted, as of 3 December, 2021, the day when the most recent set of public health restrictions was announced.
The strengthening of overall demand for new workers showed little sign of easing, despite a rise in COVID-19 cases in November and concerns about the omicron variant. While new job postings (those on Indeed for seven days or less) dipped in late November, the inflow of new jobs remained well above pre-pandemic levels as of 3 December.
It is not yet clear whether the dip represents a change to the long-term upward trend. We will watch this trend closely in the coming weeks.
Food and hospitality postings remain above pre-pandemic levels but they are falling
Media & communications, food preparation & service, and hospitality & tourism saw the biggest declines in the two weeks to 3 December. The decline in postings for pub, restaurant, hotel and travel-related jobs may have been driven by the introduction of a midnight closing time in mid-November. Growing uncertainty about the demand outlook, prompted by rising cases, may also have contributed to the decline in food and hospitality postings, although other high-exposure, customer-facing occupations like retail and arts & entertainment still showed growth during that period.
We will continue to provide updates as the situation evolves. We also host the data behind the postings trends plots on Github as downloadable CSV files, which are updated regularly.
Methodology
All figures in this blog post are the percentage change in seasonally-adjusted job postings since 1 February, 2020, using a seven-day trailing average. 1 February, 2020, is our pre-pandemic baseline. We seasonally adjust each series based on historical patterns in 2017, 2018, and 2019. Each series, including the national trend, occupational sectors, and sub-national geographies, is seasonally adjusted separately. We adopted this new methodology in January 2021.
The number of job postings on Indeed.com, whether related to paid or unpaid job solicitations, is not indicative of potential revenue or earnings of Indeed, which comprises a significant percentage of the HR Technology segment of its parent company, Recruit Holdings Co., Ltd. Job posting numbers are provided for information purposes only and should not be viewed as an indicator of performance of Indeed or Recruit. Please refer to the Recruit Holdings investor relations website and regulatory filings in Japan for more detailed information on revenue generation by Recruit’s HR Technology segment.