The Panama job outlook continues to worsen as hirings in the private sector in November hit the lowest level in the last five years with just  13,451 labor agreements signed or renewed, most of them temporary.

The figure represents a 20% decrease compared to the hiring carried out in the same month of 2018, when 16. 857 labor agreements were recorded, according to figures from the Ministry of Labor.

In the case of the year-on-year comparison, as of November, hiring fell 15.8%, down from 239,310 between January and November 2018, to 201,466 in the first 11 months of this year.

The experts projected that the labor market in 2019 would be marked by the decrease in hiring before the electoral process of the month of May, the economic slowdown, the negotiation of the new minimum wage and the completion of large projects.