It’s not the news job seekers in London want to hear.
A new survey has found employers in the London-area are expecting a mild hiring climate for the fourth quarter of 2017.
The latest ManpowerGroup Employment Outlook Survey found only 10 per cent of employers plan to hire for the upcoming quarter (October to December), while zero per cent anticipate cutbacks.
“With seasonal variations removed from the data, London’s fourth quarter Net Employment Outlook of eight per cent is a 10 percentage point decrease when compared to the previous quarterly Outlook,” Erica Melarangeli of Manpower’s London office said in a release. “It is also a decrease of three percentage points from the Outlook reported during the same time last year, indicating a conservative hiring pace for the upcoming months.”
The survey comes less than a week after the London-St. Thomas unemployment rate fell to a 13-year low at 5.4 per cent.
The low unemployment figure was driven by a sharp decline in the labour force, not job creation. 6,100 people left the labour force while 800 jobs were lost in August and another 5,300 people stopped claiming unemployment.
London had only a 59.7 per cent labour participation rate.
The last time the jobless rate was this low was late 2004.
The Manpower survey found the most expected hiring activity to happen in Ontario, Quebec and B.C., led by an anticipated moderate uplift in the oil and gas sector. The national trend for the final quarter of 2017 predicts a modest hiring climate.