Staffing Industry Shed 44,000 Jobs Quarter-to-Quarter, a 2% Decline
U.S. staffing companies employed an average of almost 2.2 million temporary and contract workers per week in the second quarter of 2024, according to data released today by the American Staffing Association—down 44,000 jobs from the first quarter of 2024.
Staffing employment continued to be affected by ongoing caution by clients on adding headcount given current macroeconomic conditions, as staffing employment in the second quarter contracted by 2% from the first quarter and 11.6% on a year-to-year basis.
Staffing sales reached a total of $31.0 billion in the second quarter of 2024, marking a 1.6% decline from the first quarter and a 13.8% decline from the previous year. As seen in 2023, this contraction bucks the seasonal trend of consistent sequential growth within the staffing industry from the second to fourth quarters of the year.
Private staffing companies remain cautious about the future, expecting their fourth quarter revenue to be essentially flat (a median -0.4%) year-to-year, and their full year 2024 sales to be down a median 3.2% compared with 2023.
“The cooling of labor markets continued to affect staffing employment and sales in the second quarter,” says Richard Wahlquist, ASA chief executive officer. “There is reason for optimism over the next year, as lowering interest rates will give businesses the capacity to step up spending on capital expenditures as well as on their expenditures for permanent and flexible talent to increase hiring in the coming months.”
To learn more about the quarterly ASA Staffing Employment and Sales Survey, visit americanstaffing.net/quarterly-survey or follow ASA research on X.
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About the American Staffing Association (ASA)
The American Staffing Association is the voice of the U.S. staffing, recruiting, and workforce solutions industry. ASA and its state affiliates advance the interests of the industry across all sectors through advocacy, research, education, and the promotion of high standards of legal, ethical, and professional practices. For more information about ASA, visit americanstaffing.net.
