Sarah Coles, head of personal finance at Hargreaves Lansdown, said: “If it feels like life has got tougher for job hunters, that’s because it has.
“There are now 2.5 unemployed people per vacancy. Aside from the pandemic, this is the highest level in just over a decade.
“Vacancies finally rose very slightly – after 39 consecutive quarters, but they’re still down 99,000 in a year.
“Meanwhile unemployment rose during the month, particularly among men. For those in work, pay rises were squeezed again, so after CPI inflation, pay is up just 1 per cent in a year.
“Unemployment is a hammer blow to financial resilience. The new HL Savings and Resilience Barometer shows that on average, households where the head is unemployed don’t have a single penny left at the end of the month.
“Overall, households have enough cash to cover more than three months of their essential spending. Among unemployed households, this falls to less than a week.
“There are lots of forces at work, from slower economic growth to the rise in employers’ National Insurance making it more expensive to employ people.
“The fact that we’ve seen jobs fall among retail, real estate, construction, and across the services industry, indicate there’s likely to be a cyclical element to jobs.
“This is also reflected in the fact that the biggest rises in employment are in health and social work, which are less affected by the bigger economic picture.
“AI will be playing its part. The fall in the number of information and communication roles, as well as professional, scientific and technical jobs will do nothing to alleviate concerns among higher earners that AI could be coming for their jobs.
“The drop in the number of administrative and support staff could be a sign that finding an entry level job into some professions is getting harder as technology steps in.
“There is a silver lining to this bad news, because lower wage rises will be music to the ears of the Bank of England.
“Last week it said further rate cuts will depend on signs that inflation is easing. The fact there’s such a narrow margin between wages and inflation is a clear sign of this.
“People won’t have more money in their pockets and employers won’t be driving up prices to cover the cost of pay hikes, so the pressure on prices will be easing.
“Nobody likes to think that more difficult times could be on the way, but if you consider the risks and make a plan, you’ll be in a far better position to deal with it if you need to.
“It’s worth revisiting your emergency savings. Ideally you should have enough cash to cover 3-6 months’ worth of essential spending – in a competitive easy access savings account.
“This will help keep you on track if you are out of work for a period. At the moment, the HL Barometer shows just over half of people are in this position (52 per cent), so it’s worth checking you’re one of them.”
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