What's the little-known fact about roughly one out of six of the private-sector jobs added in New Jersey last year?
They won't last. Employment in the temporary job market accounted for around 15 percent to 22 percent of the gains in the state?s private sector last year, according to a Star-Ledger analysis of data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and the state Department of Labor and Workforce Development.
Experts say New Jersey employers are hiring more temp workers because of the state?s sluggish recovery from the recession. The state?s economy has grown slower than the national average, while its overall unemployment rate has stayed higher. One of the few bright spots has been in temp help, which has gained back all the jobs it lost, and then some.
"Right now, employers are looking to date. They?re not looking to get married," said Patrick O?Keefe, a former deputy assistant secretary of the U.S. Department of Labor and now director of economic research at CohnReznick in Roseland.
Depending on which federal employment survey is used, New Jersey?s private sector added either 40,000 or 59,000 jobs last year. But just over 8,600 of those jobs were classified as temporary help services, preliminary data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics? Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages show.
By comparison, that same data showed temp jobs last year accounted for around one out of 14 private-sector positions added nationally, about half the rate of New Jersey.
Even as the recovery continues there are questions as to whether temp work will become a more permanent fixture of the labor economy. The sector had been growing before the recession. But in recent years, companies have gotten a taste for flexible work arrangements, and there are signs that will continue, says Jack Wellman, president of Joul? Staffing Solutions in Edison.
And while temp work used to be the province of typists from Kelly Services and day laborers from Manpower, staffing firms now supply workers across the gamut of professions, from low-skill, blue-collar work to highly specialized fields such as accounting and emergency-room doctors.
"The reality at the moment is there?s probably not a job where there is not a temporary staffing equivalent," Wellman said.
Economists and labor experts say it is still too early to say what role temp jobs will play in the coming years.
The temp industry tends to be the first out of the gate during a recovery, said Charles Steindel, chief economist at the state Department of Treasury. "Then it passes the baton to another," he said.
He said there are signs that is already happening, noting that some of the most recent data show the trend is slowing down.
"Hopefully," he said, "we?re in the baton-passing stage."
An industry group that represents temp agencies in the state is hoping that?s not yet the case.
Collaborating
The New Jersey Staffing Alliance has met with officials at the state?s labor department to discuss how to collaborate more with the state?s jobs centers, known as One-Stop Career Centers, and help steer those who are unemployed to temp agencies, according to Wellman of Joul?, who is also the group?s vice president of legal affairs.
"It makes so much sense," he said, "The question becomes, ?Why didn?t we do this so much sooner?? "
Wellman said temp agencies and the labor department essentially have the same mission: put people to work.
The vast majority of workers won?t be looking for jobs through temp agencies, said Carl Van Horn, director of the John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development at Rutgers University. "I don?t think it?s a new normal for everybody, but it is a growing phenomenon," he said.
"The thing that will blow all of this out is a robust recovery," he added. "That will force employers to compete for a robust workforce."
But when?
As anyone reading the economy lately knows, it?s unclear when that will happen.
Growth in New Jersey?s economy has been slow. Last year, the state?s gross domestic product grew 1.3 percent, compared with the nationwide average of 2.5 percent, the Commerce Department said in June.
On top of sluggish growth, some companies face fundamental challenges to how they run their business, from the Affordable Care Act mandate that they offer health insurance to restrictions on financial firms by the Dodd-Frank Act, says O?Keefe of CohnReznick.
"In both cases, employers may be reluctant to make strategic decisions as to long-term employment," he said. Instead, they?d rather pay a little extra to a temporary agency than bring on workers to their payrolls.
For many workers, temp jobs are less ideal.
While some temp jobs, such as those in information technology and health care, offer better hourly pay than if they were on salary, according to Jon Osborne of research group Staffing Industry Analysts, data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show the average wage of temp workers in New Jersey to be significantly less than the overall average wage. Average annual pay in the temp sector was $27,846 last year, compared to with overall average of $58,622, according to preliminary estimates from the Quarterly Census on Employment and Wages.
A recent poll by Staffing Industry Analysts found that large companies that use flexible staff ? including temp and contract workers ? have increased the amount of such staff to about 16 percent of their workforce, and had plans to grow that further to 18 percent.
"There?s no question the trend is going up," Osborne said. "The reason is flexibility."
But, he was quick to note, "Temp labor is not taking over the world."
While some workers, like employers, prefer the flexibility of a temp job, such jobs generally don?t have the security or benefits of permanent positions. Built up over a long time, such insecurity can force people to become more cautious consumers, O?Keefe said.
Still, he said, "a temporary job is better than no job."
A gateway
Staffing firms say temp work often is a gateway to full-time employment. And more companies now look to try out a worker through a temp arrangement before bringing them on permanently, said Koleen Singerline, a 20-year staffing industry vet and co-founder of the Work Group in Shrewsbury.
"It allows companies to determine who is the best fit for a long-term hire," she said.
Sonia Rodriguez-Trench is an example of that trend.
A former aspiring actress, the 43-year-old from Keyport has been taking temp jobs after her husband was let go by his investment bank.
Having held assistant-level jobs in offices and work at a department store make-up counter, she said she has strived to stand out in workplaces where she could be seen as just passing through.
"You have to go in and don?t even consider yourself a temp," Rodriguez-Trench said. "You have to consider yourself part of team."
But contracts would end and she?d be set adrift. Landing new work, even through an agency, took patience and stamina, she said.
Finally, opportunity knocked in May.
Silab, a Paris-based supplier to cosmetics manufacturers, needed a temporary sales assistant for a small office it has in Hazlet. But it also promised something more: permanent employment at the end of three months.
That?s what happened Thursday. Rodriguez-Trench, to her joy and relief, became a full-time, permanent member of Silab?s payroll.
"I looked for a home, I found a home and I?m staying," she said in an interview last week. "I?m very grateful."
Source: http://www.nj.com/business/index.ssf/2013/08/new_jerseys_jobs_recovery_fuel.html
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