The year 2024 saw a slowdown in the COVID-19 recovery on EU job vacancies following the 2023 trend.
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Belgium and the Netherlands registered the highest job vacancy rates among EU countries in the last three months of 2024, with 4.1% of jobs in their labour markets currently unfilled, according to the latest Eurostat figures.
Austria followed these two countries at 3.6%.
On the other hand, Bulgaria, Poland, and Romania had the lowest rates for job openings, all at 0.7%, with Spain following at 0.9%.
When comparing this quarter to the same quarter of the previous year, the job vacancy rate increased in four EU countries, remained stable in six, and decreased in 17 EU countries.
The largest increases were observed in Denmark, Spain, Croatia, and Malta, each rising by 0.1 percentage points.
Meanwhile, the largest decreases were recorded in Germany with less than 0.7 percentage points, Greece with 0.6 percentage points, and France and Austria both with less than 0.5 percentage points.
The impact of COVID-19 on job vacancies in the EU was more severe than the 2009 recession.
Despite the fast recovery, with two consecutive years of strong growth in 2021 and 2022, the rate has declined again in 2023 and 2024, which signals a slowdown.
Which sectors report the most vacancies?
The highest job vacancy rates were recorded in “Administrative and support service activities”, followed by “Construction, Information and communication”, “Professional, scientific and technical activities", and “Accommodation and food service activities”.
Among the vacancies advertised online during this period, sales, marketing and development managers were in the highest demand.
While occupations in the public sector, such as healthcare workers and teachers, may also face recruitment difficulties, they did not rank among the most sought-after occupations online.
This may be because these positions are often not advertised on the Internet.