2024-10-25 11:30:00
Employment grew by 138,300 people in the third quarter of the year and exceeds 21 million employed, according to data from the Active Population Survey (EPA) made public this Friday by the National Institute of Statistics (INE), which show l entrepreneurs’ commitment to business and employment.
The increase in employment, however, is lower than that of the same quarter of the previous year (+209,100). This weakening highlights at least three factors slowing hiring and entrepreneurial activity: regulatory uncertainty, the European economic slowdown and persistent increases in labor costs.
The proximity of regulatory changes constitutes a disincentive to hiring decisions until the future employment framework is defined. Employers have had to endure sudden regulatory changes and are now faced with possibly imposing a reduction in hours without affecting wages, a situation that has a particularly severe impact on SMEs and, therefore, their workforce projections.
This context not only limits hiring, but also entrepreneurial activity, especially in smaller companies. Proof of this is the drop of 87,800 self-employed workers in the third quarter, well above that recorded in the same period of the previous year (-60,200). Furthermore, there are 89,300 fewer companies with employees in the self-employed category than a year ago, which represents a decline of 8.6%. At the same time, the number of self-employed workers without employees is growing (+62,500 more). The total number of self-employed workers (with and without employees) shows a decrease of 36,600 units in interannual terms.
Another exogenous factor is added to the factor of regulatory uncertainty: the economic slowdown in the European context which will hit Spain.
On the other hand, the foreseeable increase in labor costs resulting from the expected changes in the working day will be combined with new increases in contributions and the minimum wage starting from January, which will once again restrict companies’ margins in a context of sluggish investments.
There also remains concern about the weakening of the primary sector, which also lost jobs in the third quarter (-38,300), although to a lesser extent than the previous year. Far from being reassuring, this is an industry with a minimal workforce.
CEPYME requires a stable working framework that SMEs need to be able to adapt to the economic situation. The Spanish productive fabric has demonstrated its commitment to employment and its resilience to increases in labor costs that reduce its margins. For all these reasons, any measure that affects SMEs must be the result of slow reflection outside the political battle and must generate a tailwind for businesses instead of new obstacles to activity.
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