County job market mostly flat for October

October continued a low activity trend for the job market in Fairfield County, with a modest 1 percent increase in job-posting activity. This continues a softness trend that started in May, indicating that the market still remains stuck in neutral.

Some key items of note regarding October:

Ӣ Stamford led all towns in the county with the most jobs posted, followed by Greenwich and Norwalk.

Ӣ The industries most actively hiring this past month were accounting, financial services and health care.

Ӣ Top job categories were administrative, accountancy and health services.

In looking at this month”™s data there are a few story lines. Overall the main message is that the job market in the county is relatively modest in its activity. While Stamford, for example, continues to lead all area cities in terms of new jobs posted there remains a lack of emerging industry or even a “hot” company in the area that is dominating any specific sector. Further, with the election of David Martin as mayor or Stamford, his past comments opposing significant aspects of the Bridgewater waterfront project suggest that the deal to bring their jobs and associated potential positive impact to the area economy is far from locked up.

So what is the state of the local market? On election night Joe McGee, vice president of public policy for the Business Council of Fairfield County, cited that Stamford has lost close to 9,000 jobs over the last 10 years, attributed mostly to the consolidation of the financial services industry that has dominated the city. With the possibility of further erosion of that market sector, namely that of UBS and its continued movement of resources to other markets, Stamford and other surrounding towns in the county need to find new business to take up residence in some of the 25 percent-plus vacant commercial space in the county.

The outlook for the rest of Q4 of 2013 now suggests a relatively neutral level of activity. That can only be complicated by the politics tied to our national budget and debt ceiling, as well as the ongoing issues with the rollout of the Affordable Care Act and their effect on business. Stay tuned.

David Lewis is President/CEO of FairfieldCountyJobs.com, with more than 100,000 visitors a month viewing jobs from more than 4,000 area employers. His monthly reports talk to the condition of the job market as measured by data from his websites as well as data from state, federal and industry sources in the public domain. You can learn more about David and his team at FairfieldCountyJobs.com.