March 26, 2010

Summer-job prospects expected to stay at '09 level

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For the last couple of years, our measure of what is considered a "good job market" has taken some lumps. While Wall Street seems to have bounced back quickly from its 2008-09 bender, the nation's unemployed are still acutely feeling the hangover. In the so-called "jobless recovery," just maintaining the anemic levels of job openings from the previous year can be considered a small victory.

That's basically the take-away we get from the recent survey by Ipsos Public Affairs regarding summer job prospects this year. As the next batch of high-school and college-age kids prepare to make their annual entry into the job market, they are at least facing no worse a job market than their peers saw last year.

According to the more than 1,000 hiring managers who responded to the annual survey, co-sponsored by the temporary job website SnagAJob.com, nearly half (47 percent) said they would not be making any seasonal hiring this summer and 29 percent said they would hire the same number of people, which was pretty much what they said last year. On a brighter note, the percentage of respondents who said they would hire fewer seasonal worker has dipped from 23 percent last year to just 18 percent for this summer.

"Given the year that we've had, 'unchanged' on the summer job front is pretty good news," said Shawn Boyer, CEO of SnagAJob.com. "It's a relief that we're not again seeing the kind of negative trends that we saw when comparing expectations for last summer with '08. Summer jobs will be available this year, but teens and college students must apply as soon as possible to multiple positions in order to stand a chance of landing one."

Competition will, as always, be fierce, Boyer said, especially with the number of older workers being forced into the seasonal market by recession-induced layoffs. Those who are re-applying for jobs they held last summer, however, will have a leg up on the newbies - managers in the survey indicated that, on average, they tend to hire about 65 percent returning workers and 35 percent new ones.

And the pay? Excluding tips from service jobs, summer workers can expect to earn about $10.20 per hour, on average. Not exactly a living wage for many job seekers, but it can be part of a "portfolio" of part-time jobs to pay some bills and fill in resume gaps as you continue to search for more permanent work.

Randy Woods writes about job-search tools, networking techniques and other tips to help you land your dream job.

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market trends, part-time work

1 Comments

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