The British labor market is displaying signs of cooling, as revealed by a drop in online job vacancies and salary offerings, based on data from the job search website Adzuna. These findings will
be noted by the Bank of England ahead of this week's interest rate decision.
In September, online job advertisements saw a 1.6% decline from August, which is contrary to the typical end-of-summer surge in job postings. Advertised salaries also decreased by the same percentage, according to Adzuna.
Adzuna's co-founder, Andrew Hunter, stated, "September traditionally experiences an upswing in job market activity, but the figures for this year could suggest a moderation in the labor market, which had demonstrated resilience earlier in the year."
The Bank of England, widely expected to maintain interest rates at their 15-year high of 5.25% on Thursday, is working to assess the remaining inflationary pressures within the job market. This task has been made more challenging by issues encountered by Britain's official statistics office in conducting its workforce surveys.
Earlier this month, the Office for National Statistics reported that its job vacancy measure dropped to a two-year low of 988,000 in the three months through September.
Separately, a survey released on Monday indicated that small businesses have somewhat regained their lost confidence, although the overall sentiment remained negative.
The headline confidence reading, published by the Federation of Small Businesses, increased to -8.0 in the three months ending in September, up from -14.2 in the second quarter but still below the -2.8 recorded in the first quarter.
Among significant sectors, hospitality firms displayed the most pessimism, followed by retailers and wholesalers, as well as the construction sector. The only sector with a positive outlook was professional, scientific, and technical firms, according to the FSB.
Martin McTague, FSB's national chair, mentioned that the survey reflects signs of stabilization following 18 months of rising costs.
"The improvement in the overall confidence measure since Q2 is a good start, but we really want to see it firmly back in positive territory, rather than eight points below zero, as it is currently," McTague noted. Photo by Betty Longbottom, Wikimedia commons.