I applaud employers who haven’t laid people off so far, but I can’t help but think of 2007 when hiring quickly dried up. Back then, hiring slammed on the brakes while the rest of the economy slowly ground to a halt over the next year.
This time, it is not a financial problem stalling the economy, but the results are looking all too familiar. Hiring of Truss and Panel Designers is our industry’s bellwether. Never on an even pace, it is either right now or not now. Even during a normal year, hiring cycles are up in April, down in July, back up in October and November, then mostly off until April. This year, the April rush to hire didn’t happen. Instead, we started seeing layoffs.
Housing starts are down drastically year over year, unemployment is at 15%+, and for some manufacturers business is off 30%. Still, layoffs in our industry have been minimal compared to most sectors. Government is telling us that the magic bullet to get the economy back on track is a vaccine, and projections are that, while progress is being made, only 100,000 doses will be available by December. Even if they ramp up production and go all out, projections are that enough vaccine won’t be available until sometime next year. Cue the April hiring rush.
Hopefully, as we navigate our path through this pandemic, the economic decline will slow and reverse course. Still, with the opening of America underway, I fear that infection rates and deaths will spike as more people return to a normal life and forgo social distancing guidelines. We can only hope that our government will be prudent and weigh the risks of managing the resulting cases against once again going on lock down and paralyzing the economy. Will we see an April hiring rush in 2021? If the stars align, a vaccine is readily available, and we get COVID-19 under control, April will be a very good month for the building components manufacturing industry.