Shop workers to be most demanded by end-year

All the summer jobs are now diminishing, and from November, additional employments in the trade sector are beginning, because that is the month of discounts. It is followed by December, ahead of the holidays, when purchase is at its peak. In Serbia, in the third quarter of this year, according to the latest data of the Statistical Office of the Republic of Serbia, there were 2.36 million employees, but compared to the previous quarter, the number of employees was lower by 1,498 workers. Still, if the most recent data are compared with those from the third quarter of 2023, the number of employees is higher by 4,910 people. The economists from the Macroeconomic Analyses and Trends (MAT) magazine remind what the expectations of companies for the next three months are when it comes to the number of employed workers.

– In the September survey, 28.9% companies said that they planned to increase the number of employees in the next three months. Furthermore, 0.5% companies plan a reduction in the same period, which is a slightly better result compared to August (one percent) – it is said in the latest issue of MAT.

Experts remind that the expectation when it comes to new employments are bigger compared to August and compared to September of 2023, the analysis adds.

However, Dragoljub Rajic of the Business Support Network (BSN) believes that the majority of companies in Serbia will strive to meet their business plans by the beginning of 2025 and that they will employ people only when new business activities or an expansion of the workload are planned, which mostly happens only in spring.

– In the structure of our economy, plenty depends on seasonal jobs and the time of the year. All the summer jobs are now diminishing, and from November, additional employments in the trade sector are beginning, because that is the month of discounts. It is followed by December, ahead of the holidays, when purchase is at its peak. That is why workers in shops, transport and goods distribution, but also marketing and design, because now a large number of ads are uploaded and prepared online, are needed – points out Rajic and adds that, on the other hand, the number of employees in construction is dropping, because a part of the construction jobs stop around the New Year’s holidays or are reduced in intensity.

– Except for said fields, new employments in November and December are not typical – he adds and reminds that, in the past two years, the inflation has “eaten” all the economic growth.

– We have in fact had only the maintenance of that growth, and occasionally, some companies could offer high-quality tech products, which is why they did achieve growth and development, managing to place their goods in other markets as well. Still, there are few such companies in the structure of our economy – points out Rajic, who believes that the blows to the economy are to arrive only when the inflation wave passes.

– Companies in Serbia are to feel those consequences only now, so many of them, instead of investing in development, will have to invest in repairing the consequences of the inflation. What will in fact happen then is that the capacity for further employments will start dropping, because in practice, one year of inflation means two years of stagnation in business – explains Rajic.

Republički zavod za statistiku

BSN-Mreža za poslovnu podršku Beograd

Dragoljub Rajić

employment of shop workers