Confidence in economy drops fast amongst hirers, but jobs outlook remains more robust

In the third quarter of 2022, employers’ confidence in both the UK economic outlook and their own ability to invest in their business declined markedly. Both measures surpassed the lows of the pandemic (-67 on the economic outlook in July-Sept 2022 by comparison with -57 in 2020, and -27 on investment intentions for their own business by comparison with -13 in 2020). That’s according to new data from the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC).

Despite this drop in confidence, the immediate outlook for hiring remains positive – employers report that hiring intentions for permanent staff were +17 over the next three months and +18 over the next year, both down 6 points from last quarter. Intentions on temporary work were +6 and +4 over the same time periods.