The first quarter of the year has ended with a loss of employment of 139,800 jobsthe most pronounced for this period since the pandemic and, not counting 2020, since 2014, which is fundamentally explained by the destruction of full-time jobs. In total, the number of people employed with this type of work day fell by 199.700 personaswhile 59,900 were created positions part time.
This means that for every part-time job created, three full-time jobs were destroyed. In the first quarter of last year, this relationship was practically one to one (for every part-time job created, 1.3 full-time jobs were lost), according to data from the Active Population Survey published this Friday.
That of the first quarter has been destruction of full-time employment ms accused that is produced in the country since the year 2013in which 386,600 positions of this type were lost in the period from January to March, in the midst of the financial crisis and the debt crisis.
The activities in which the most full-time jobs have been eliminated in the first quarter of the year are professional, scientific and technical, which are characterized by their greater added value and have suffered a drop of 47,300 positions after having shown a lot of dynamism in the previous quarters.
There have also been losses in the financial and insurance activities (-37,500); in it trade wholesale and retail (-37,500); the Public Administration, defense and Social Security (-31,800) and the activities of the homes as employers (-30,200). This last segment includes domestic employment and that of personnel hired on property owners as janitors, and it is a job with a high incidence of Minimum Interprofessional Wage (SMI)which rose in January to 1,134 euros per month in fourteen payments.
On the contrary, activities that have registered a greater dynamism in part-time employment have been education (with 26,200 more employees), hospitality (+16,400), commerce (+15,900), artistic, recreational and entertainment activities (+15,500) and household activities as employers (+5,100).
The growth of part-time employment in hospitality, commerce or recreational activities has been influenced by the fact that Easter has fallen this year in March, so seasonal employment associated with the tourism sector has occurred in the first quarter of the year.
On the other hand, the creation of part-time positions in the domestic employment could denote that given the increase in costs for employers due to the increase in the SMI, there could have been a transfer from full-time jobs to part-time jobs, that is, a reduction of working hours to save on labor costs.
First every year of the hours since covid
If the evolution of employment in the last year is analyzed, the EPA shows that the number of busy has grown and 2.8% from the first quarter of 2023 to the same period of 2024; however, the hours totals actually worked in the economy They have fallen 0.3%.
It’s about the first every year year of hours worked since the pandemic – the last decrease occurred in the first quarter of 2021, because from then on comparisons were made with the months of confinement after the declaration of the State of Alarm in the country.
The drop in hours worked is parallel to the part-time employment boom: a year ago it was a 13,7% of the total occupation, but now represents a 13,8%which in absolute numbers implies that there are 2.94 million people in Spain with this type of contract compared to 2.82 million in the first quarter of 2023.
It also occurs in a context in which the number of employed people does not work despite having a job (or at least that it did not do so in the reference week, usually the one prior to the time of the INE survey) has grown by 53.7% year-on-year, with a particularly striking increase in those who do not go to work due to illness, accident or Temporary Disability. The increase in casualties recorded the previous year thus continues.