OVI for October 2023: Labor demand rises by 4.2 percent in the first 10 months

November 3, 2023

In October, the OVI index rose by 3.6 percent on an annual level, representing a growth of the index for the third month in a row. Seasonally adjusted figures also show that the OVI index has increased in three consecutive months: after 3.2 percent in August and 5.1 percent in September, in October, the index rose by an additional 0.8 percent compared to the previous month, or cumulatively by 9.1 percent in three months. Considering such a good start to the last quarter of the year, we can expect the entire 2023 to end positively, i.e., with continued strong demand in the labor market. In the first 10 months of this year, the index rose by 4.2 percent in total compared to the same period last year.

Compared to October 2022, the occupations of salesperson, teacher, cook, and waiter remained among the five most sought-after occupations, but warehouse workers took over the fifth place from bookkeepers. The largest drop among the most sought-after occupations was once again recorded for programmers, who fell from the 11th to the 27th place, while demand grew the most for medical doctors and dentists, who rose from the 22nd place in October 2022 to the 13th most sought-after occupation in October 2023. The biggest contribution to the job advertisement growth rate came from advertisements for warehouse workers, drivers, and repair workers, while the largest negative contribution came from advertisements for teachers, programmers, and salespersons.

The share of job advertisements seeking secondary level of education rose by 3.3 percentage points to 41.6 percent over the year, while, at the same time, those requiring higher levels of education fell by 3.8 percentage points to 44.8 percent. Most job advertisements (51.2 percent) offered permanent employment, rising by 5.1 percentage points compared to October last year. Two Adriatic regions recorded a decrease in the number of job advertisements in October on an annual level, while eastern Croatia had the highest growth rate, at 11 percent. The biggest contribution to the number of job advertisements in eastern Croatia came from advertisements for medical doctors and dentists, telecommunications staff, and cooks, while the largest negative contribution in Adriatic Croatia came from advertisements for teachers, salespersons, and nurses. Only two occupations were included among the top five occupations in all four regions: salespersons and teachers. Cooks and warehouse workers were among the most sought-after occupations in three regions, while waiters and medical doctors were among the highest in demand in two of the four regions.

 

What is OVI?

Online Vacancy Index (OVI) is a monthly index of online job advertisements developed by the Institute of Economics, Zagreb in cooperation with the web portal MojPosao. The index aims to provide timely information regarding current labor demands. OVI index is developed by means of simple enumeration of single new job advertisements whose application deadlines end within the same month for which the index is being calculated. Given that advertisements published by only one web portal are taken into account, the number of job advertisements is expressed as an index (with the base year being 2020). 

The index is to be interpreted in such a way that the values greater than 100 represent growth when compared to 2020, and accordingly, that the values less than 100 represent a decrease with respect to the base year. The index is seasonally adjusted using the X-12-ARIMA method.