Job seekers may face stiff competition when looking for seasonal work

The holiday shopping season wouldn’t be possible without seasonal workers, hired for only a few weeks to help make the magic happen.

Amazon will be hiring 250,000 full, part-time and seasonal workers this year — the same number as last year.

Other retailers, like Bath and Body Works and Target, also plan to hire thousands of workers this season. This year, Macy’s is scaling back. The retailer said it would add 31,500 seasonal positions — about 6,000 fewer than last year.

According to Indeed’s Hiring Lab, as of September 24, seasonal job postings were half of a percentage point higher than the same time in 2019, but 12% lower than the peak in 2021, putting seasonal hiring back closer to pre-pandemic levels.

Mark Hamrick, senior economic analyst for Bankrate, says years of inflation have impacted both spenders and stores.

“While inflation on a year-over-year and month-over-month basis has been coming down, consumers are still up against it when it comes to elevated prices,” he said.

RELATED STORY | Robust hiring highlights surprising September US jobs report

While the number of seasonal jobs are down, Indeed says searches for seasonal work are up 18% from last year — meaning if you want seasonal work this year, it’s going to be competitive.

Hamrick says the fewer seasonal jobs and increase of people wanting them isn’t necessarily a bad omen for the economy.

“So many things were sort of knocked out of whack distorted by the pandemic, the shutting down of the economy and the rapid reopening in the economy when we had a red hot job market. And now the job market is essentially normal,” said Hamrick.

As far as spending goes, Mastercard forecasts a 3.2% increase in holiday shopping this year over last.