Harmed by the economic slowdown and the closing of jobs in commerce, formal job creation fell in February. According to data released by the General Register of Employed and Unemployed People (Caged), of the Labor Secretariat of the Ministry of Economy, 241,785 jobs with a formal contract were opened in the last month. The indicator measures the difference between hiring and firing.
In the same month of last year, 328,507 jobs had been created, in the unadjusted data, which do not consider declarations submitted late by employers. Despite the slowdown in relation to February last year, there continues to be an improvement in relation to December, when 440,669 posts had been closed. In January, 84,571 were created.
Considering the months of January and February, 326,356 vacancies were opened. This is the lowest result for the first two months of the year since the reformulation of Caged, in 2020. The comparison considers data with adjustments, when the Ministry of Labor registers declarations submitted after the deadline by employers and rectifies data from previous months . The change in methodology does not make it possible to compare with years prior to 2020.
Sectors
In the division by branches of activity, four of the five surveyed sectors created formal jobs in February. The statistic was led by services, with the opening of 164.2 thousand jobs, followed by civil construction, with 40,380 more jobs. In third place comes industry (processing, extraction and other types) with the creation of 22,246 jobs.
The level of employment increased in agriculture, with the opening of 16,284 jobs. Only commerce, pressured by the closing of temporary vacancies typical of the beginning of the year, extinguished formal jobs last month, with the closing of 1,325 vacancies.
Highlights
In services, job creation was driven by the segment of public administration, defense and social security, education, human health and social services, with the opening of 90,381 formal jobs. The category of Information, communication and financial, real estate, professional and administrative activities opened 29,026 vacancies.
In industry, the positive highlight was the transformation industry, which hired 37,190 more workers than it dismissed. In second place was the water, sewage, waste management and decontamination sector, which created 1,672 vacancies.
Caged’s statistics do not detail hiring and dismissals by trade segment. The previous historical series, which lasted until 2020, separated data from wholesale and retail trade.
Regions
All Brazilian regions created formal jobs in February. The Southeast led the opening of vacancies, with 110,575 more jobs, followed by the South, with 63,309 jobs. Then comes the Midwest, with 29,959 posts. The Northeast opened 23,164 jobs. After two consecutive months extinguishing formal jobs, the North created 12,456 formal jobs last month.
In the division by Federation units, all registered a positive balance in February. The highlights in job creation were São Paulo (+65,356 jobs), Minas Gerais (+26,983) and Paraná (+24,081). The smallest increases occurred in Amapá (+139 posts), Alagoas (+160) and Roraima (+220).
