{"id":482883,"date":"2026-06-18T02:32:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-18T02:32:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/482883\/"},"modified":"2026-06-18T02:32:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-18T02:32:09","slug":"employment-growth-rises-in-may-as-labour-market-shows-resilience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/482883\/","title":{"rendered":"Employment growth rises in May as labour market shows resilience"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"EoZyGajGNiPxVf\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cIt\u2019s still volatile out there with economic head winds a defining feature of the current environment,\u201d Neil Webster, Employment Hero general manager New Zealand, said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EoZyGajGNiPxVf\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cBut businesses are adapting, growing where possible, and continuing to invest in their teams in a targeted way to support business success.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"EoZyGajGNiPxVf\" style=\"display:none\">Agriculture was down 7.9% compared to April, but year on year employment growth was up 16.1%.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EoZyGajGNiPxVf\" style=\"display:none\">Webster said strong farm incomes and ongoing innovation was helping to drive solid employment growth in the sector over the long term.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EoZyGajGNiPxVf\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cAgriculture and horticulture are making hay during an incredibly buoyant period with farming businesses expanding to meet demand and ensuring they are positioned to capitalise on the current boom,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EoZyGajGNiPxVf\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cYou only need to look at the crowds at Fieldays to see the positivity and innovation in the agriculture sector. This is reflected in the strong year on year increase in employment growth right across the sector.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"EoZyGajGNiPxVf\" style=\"display:none\">Meanwhile, wage growth was up 0.5% in May compared with the previous month.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EoZyGajGNiPxVf\" style=\"display:none\">However, there was zero growth in wages year on year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EoZyGajGNiPxVf\" style=\"display:none\">Webster said this means wage growth has hit a 13-month low, down significantly from 4.0% this time last year. <\/p>\n<p class=\"EoZyGajGNiPxVf\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cThe SME [small to medium enterprises] ecosystem is slowly but surely increasing head count, which is a good sign for driving up employment, but wages remain flat.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Stay ahead with the latest market moves, corporate updates, and economic insights by subscribing to our <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nzherald.co.nz\/my-account\/profile\/newsletters\/?from=cmp\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.nzherald.co.nz\/my-account\/profile\/newsletters\/?from=cmp\">Business newsletter<\/a> \u2013 your essential weekly round-up of all the business news you need.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cIt\u2019s still volatile out there with economic head winds a defining feature of the current environment,\u201d Neil Webster,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":482884,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[806,138,3105,219,1122,3499,78,51928,6721,225,7810,111,139,69,1881,10715,12879,15216,10042,1305,418,85273,2963],"class_list":["post-482883","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-as","tag-business","tag-data","tag-economy","tag-employment","tag-growth","tag-in","tag-increasingly","tag-labour","tag-market","tag-may","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-recovery","tag-remains","tag-resilience","tag-resilient","tag-rises","tag-show","tag-shows","tag-uneven","tag-zealands"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/482883","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=482883"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/482883\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/482884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=482883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=482883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=482883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}