July jobs report shows the U.S. is 'solidly on a slow road to recovery': American Staffing Association CEO

Yahoo Finance's Brian Sozzi and Alexis Christoforous react to the latest jobs report and discuss contract and temporary worker trends with American Staffing Association CEO Richard Wahlquist.

Video Transcript

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: --monthly jobs report has been a focus of ours all morning here on Yahoo Finance. We want to take a look at another economic indicator in the labor market, and that is contract and temporary-worker trends. Joining us now to discuss is Richard Wahlquist. He is CEO of American Staffing Association. Richard, good to see you this morning.

RICHARD WAHLQUIST: First off, just what was your reaction when you saw that the economy added 1.8 million jobs last month, and the unemployment rate fell to 10.2%? First off, Alexis, thank you for having me. And perhaps unlike some of our friends on Wall Street, I'm not disappointed. The big, big, big uptick in June was related to our being able to reopen much of the American economy, so I'm encouraged.

If we could continue to post gains like the ones we've just seen posted by BLS, I think we're solidly on a slow road back to recovery. So we're pleased.

BRIAN SOZZI: Richard, what gets the 2.9 million people that are classified as permanently unemployed, how do you get those people back to work?

RICHARD WAHLQUIST: Well, it's a good question about the permanently unemployed, Brian. I'm also concerned about all of the others that find themselves unemployed. They've been laid off, and they've been furloughed. And a lot of the folks that have been laid off and have been furloughed are in exactly the same situation as those that we characterize as permanently unemployed. They have to make searching for a job their first priority, and they're going to have competition like no one has ever experienced in any of our lifetimes because we have so many tens of millions of other people that are going to be looking for work.

So there are some things that they've got to try this this time around, and they have to use all the arrows in their quiver. One of them, we would say, would be to talk to the local temporary contract staffing company in your market, and for no money out of your pocket, they will actually do a skills assessment, and they'll let you know whether or not you've got skills that are currently in demand and give you some advice on the kinds of skills you may need to acquire if you're going to get re-employed in a tough, tough, tough job market.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: Richard, we spoke earlier to Joe LaVorgna over at the White House, and he was talking about new job opportunities being created because of COVID. Are you seeing that in the temporary-worker space? What new jobs are you seeing emerge in temp staffing right now?

RICHARD WAHLQUIST: So there's always a silver lining, and disruption is innovation. And so, yes, I mean, there's some of the obvious ones related to COVID. So we're seeing the temperature takers and the contract tracers. We're seeing a need for science support techs, and these are certificate jobs that someone could get trained to be able to do. We've got people that are in need of supporting the real-time kind of cleaning, the deep-cleaning exercises that are going on in every workplace in American and all of the industrial settings.

But the other thing we're seeing is the technology disruption that's been occurring is now something that businesses are accelerating. And I say disruption. They're using technology in ways they've never used it before. It's disrupting jobs, that's for sure, but it's also creating opportunities.

And right now, our industry is having a hard time attracting people to the COVID-related new jobs but also in IT. So we're talking about the same things that we're in high demand pre-COVID, they continue to be in high demand. And it's rather intuitive because these are people that can-- who, by and large, work from home. So we're talking about everything along the IT continuum.

BRIAN SOZZI: Why that difficulty, Richard? Is it training or they just don't want these COVID jobs?

RICHARD WAHLQUIST: Well, with regard to the COVID jobs, I'm afraid that, in some cases, it's been the support that our government has intentionally pushed out to businesses and individuals to try to keep the accounting from completely going off the rails, and I think that it's been by and large successful.

Now that some of those government stipends are beginning to end, job seekers have got to not be complacent. I mean, they've really got to be quite deliberate because they're going to be competing against more other highly skilled people than they've ever competed against in their lives.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: You think employers feel confident enough, Richard, to bring workers back, even on a temporary basis right now?

RICHARD WAHLQUIST: Great question. So what we typically see as we're coming out of a recession-- and this one is unlike any other, of course, because it was a health crisis that triggered the economic crisis. Temporary help is considered to be a coincident economic indicator and a leading employment indicator. And so the answer is that the best-case business strategy is in the early stages of a recovery. Before you know whether or not it's going to be sustainable, to begin to add back to your core group of permanent workers a flexible ring that you can continue to expand.

Now if all of a sudden we take another downturn and what feels like a U right now turns into a W, you can contract that outer ring very, very, very quickly. So it's really being able to get just-in-time workers in real-time relationship to your uptick in demand for your products and services.