Singapore’s labour market is showing strain as economy slows

Bloomberg

Singapore’s resilient labour market is starting to come under strain as the trade-reliant economy struggles in the face of global pressures.
Retrenchments are rising, companies are more cautious raising wages, and it’s getting harder for those who lose their jobs to find new work. While the central bank is optimistic of some recovery in the economy in upcoming quarters, there are signs the employment outlook may continue to deteriorate.
Analysts are closely watching Singapore’s net employment data, job vacancies, average monthly earnings, and unemployment rates.
Among 669 hiring managers in Singapore, attitudes towards the employment outlook in the final three months of the year are at their most pessimistic since the third quarter of 2017, according to the most recent ManpowerGroup survey released in September.
The difference between those saying staff numbers will increase in the fourth quarter versus those predicting a decrease is a slim 5 percentage points, the data show. Respondents in the manufacturer sector, which has been especially hard hit by the US-China trade war, expect the weakest performance in a decade, according to Lee Ju Ye, an economist at Maybank Kim Eng Research Pte Ltd.
Selena Ling, head of treasury research and strategy at Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp in Singapore, has her eyes on the job vacancy-to-unemployed ratio.
The measure slipped below 1 in the second quarter for the first time since the end of 2017, showing the city state’s jobless outnumbered open roles.