Monster Index Suggests Hiring Slowdown

By: Jennifer Saba The Monster Employment Index, which measures online employment activity in the U.S., inched up in May to 189 from 186 and is up 13% year-over-year. However, the latest data suggests a slowdown in recruitment: Year-to-date the index is up about 13% compared with 21% for the same period last year.

In a note to investors, Goldman Sachs analyst Peter Appert wrote, "The leveling off of the growth rate for the Monster Employment Index is consistent with our view that the employment market has weakened from the healthy pace of growth enjoyed in 2006."

Still, Goldman points out the index shows online help-wanted is in much better shape than newspaper employment revenue.

"While we find the long-term growth story compelling ... softer revenue growth trends in the U.S. temper our near-term enthusiasm for the shares," Goldman wrote. The research firm maintained its "neutral" rating.

Meanwhile, Classified Intelligence issued a report covering the increasing competitive pressures Monster is facing from Yahoo's HotJobs -- once a laggard in the space -- and the newspaper-owned CareerBuilder.

The report said that recruitment blogger Joel Cheesman spotted the rollback in pricing by Monster. Last year, Monster, as well as CareerBuilder, raised the cost of single job posting to $475. CareerBuilder is at $419 and HotJobs set its cost at $349. Monster lowered to cost of a single listing to $395.