The Growing Demand for Specialists Amid Rising Unemployment -The Nissay Business Conditions Survey-

the Industrial Research Dept.

Introduction

Unemployment climbed to a record 2.97 million persons in August， bringing the jobless rate to a new high of 4.3 percent. Moreover， the effective rate of job openings to job seekers， a measure of corporate hiring intentions， also fell to a new low of 0.5. The employment situation continues to deteriorate.

Amid growing concerns that the employment situation could become disastrous， how are com-panies responding in their employment trends， personnel policies， and perceptions toward spe-cialized personnel? In July and August， Nippon Life Insurance Co. and NLI Research Institute jointly conducted a nationwide survey on employment and personnel strategies， receiving re-sponses from 5，364 mostly second tier and small and mid-sized companies. The results should have a high degree of validity given the large sample size for this type of survey. In this paper， we analyze the survey results in reference to changes in the business environment and job mar-ket trends.