Published on Nov 3, 2023 at 9:22 a.m.Updated Nov. 3, 2023 at 10:16 a.m.
In its latest economic report to date, in mid-October, INSEE significantly revised downwards its forecasts for employment growth in the second half of the year, anticipating a standstill from now on . The provisional estimate that the national statistics institute published this Friday morning for the third quarter goes in this direction and even a little more.
From the publication, which only concerns the private sector and which will be confirmed or not in mid-December with the final figures, it appears that the number of employees fell by 17,700 between the end of June and the end of September, slightly more than expected. . That is to say a drop of 0.1%, after the increase of the same order during the previous quarter.
GDP at half mast
“This is the second quarter of quasi-stability after several quarters of clear increase in 2021 and 2022,” commented INSEE. Private salaried employment still exceeds its level of one year earlier by 0.7% (+138,800 jobs) and that before the health crisis (end of 2019) by 6.0% (+1.2 million jobs ).
In detail, temporary employment fell for the third consecutive quarter, by the equivalent of 40,000 positions, to the point of being slightly below its level before the health crisis. Excluding temporary work, the private sector workforce experienced varying fortunes, but all moderate: -0.2% for agricultural employment; +0.2% in industry; -0.3% in construction; stability in the commercial tertiary sector; slight decline in the non-market tertiary sector…
21.126
million jobs in the private sector according to a provisional estimate at the end of September from INSEE
If we put aside the year 2020, we have to go back to the third quarter of 2018 to find a quarterly situation of decline in the number of employees in the economy. At the time, it remained episodic. Today, the slowdown in the labor market once again goes hand in hand with the development of GDP, which increased by only 0.1% in the third quarter.
This correlation puts an end to two post-Covid years during which employment growth exceeded that of activity, to the great astonishment of economists, and to the detriment of the productivity of the economy. After the euphoric months of 2021 and 2022, should we detect the beginnings of a turnaround or a pause while waiting for activity to resume? For INSEE, it is still too early to qualify the situation.
More information to follow…