Tourism has revived local labor market

There was a surplus in the Labor Ministry’s Ergani hirings register at the end of March, despite the increase to the minimum wage and the abolition of the subminimum salary. The impact of tourism and seasonal employment, combined with the domination of flexible forms of labor, led to a rebound in the market after a rather poor start to the year.

Data showed that 43,373 new jobs were created last month, with 202,157 hirings against 158,784 departures.

However, compared with March 2018, when there had been a surplus of 55,494 jobs, the creation of salaried jobs was down by 12,121.

Consequently, 48,880 new jobs were created between January 1 and the end of March, that is 6,700 fewer than in the first quarter of 2018.

The Ergani figures also reveal that most hirings were in flexible forms of labor: In March there were 92,740 full-time hirings, but these accounted for just 45.88 percent of the month’s total, with the remaining 109,417 hirings (54.12 percent) concerning flexible employment.