Some Jobs Lost in the USA Moving To Costa Rica – Hewlett Packard (HP) alone is looking for 3,000+ more staff.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics in the USA, non-farm payroll employment declined by 3,445,000 from December 2007 through December 2008.

The collapse in employment is across the board. Construction lost 520,000 jobs, manufacturing lost 806,000 jobs. Trade, transportation and utilities lost 1,495,000 jobs (retail trade accounted for 1,120,000 of this loss).

Financial activities lost 145,000 jobs, professional and business services lost 713,000 jobs. Even government lost 188,000 jobs and many experts believe the job losses will be greater during 2009.

As the Costa Rican grows at a slower rate, it is anticipated that Costa Rica will lose some jobs in the tourism and construction sectors however, many of the professional service jobs being lost in the USA are turning up in Costa Rica…

The 2009 New Year’s job market has started off aggressively with thousands of well paying jobs being advertised in the La Nacion newspaper. These jobs are primarily in the technical field, graphic design, with companies searching for bilingual professionals, information engineering and financial experts.

Francisco Alba, the manager of Experian explained that the recession in the USA has helped the expansion of service related companies in Costa Rica. Sr. Alba added that: “The American companies want to reduce costs, they are looking for low cost options to move business divisions to other countries and Costa Rica offers this.”

Hewlett Packard located in Santa Ana has over 4,000 employees already in Costa Rica and needs over 3,000 employees to expand their workforce. Although they are looking for bilingual staff, their advertisement is in English.

Boston Scientific has two full pages of jobs advertised in English and are looking for Project Managers, Quality Assurance Product Transfer Integration Managers, Quality Assurance Laboratories Managers, Manufacturing Engineers, Facilities Engineers, Production Supervisors, Industrial Engineers, Materials Engineers, Quality Engineers, Financial Analysts, Cost Accountants, Buyers/Planners, Microbiologists, Security Coordinators, Microbiology Technicians, Manufactured Engineering Technicians, Maintenance Technicians.

Fiserv is hiring many IT people including, Web Designers, IT Help Desk staff, Software Development Engineers, COBOL programmers, Software Installation and Customer Support Analysts. Although they are looking for bilingual staff, their advertisement is in English.

Equifax is looking for a number of Senior and Junior Developers. Although they are looking for bilingual staff, their advertisement is in English.

In reading through the newspaper, there is another article talking about how avVenta is looking for over 60 new staff and Digital Arbor is trying to hire 150 – 300 new staff.

Experian is looking for over 100 new staff, Sykes is looking for 190 new staff and Western Union needs 100+ new employees.

Proctor & Gamble located in Santa Ana which already has 1,300 employees providing invaluable support to 72 countries is also hiring.

“U.S. employers shed 2.6 million jobs in 2008, the worst year since 1945″ and many experts worry that with millions of manufacturing jobs lost in the US in recent years and, more and more professional service jobs moving offshore and nearshore (Costa Rica), the US job market could be in very serious trouble and the US economy could collapse.

We hope those experts are wrong of course but meanwhile, the job market for bilingual professional services in Costa Rica is most definitely booming.

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Andrew Makarik

to@welovecostarica.com

Andrew Makarik is the main editor of WeLoveCostaRica, a fan of this sunny country. He is also a loving husband and a has a lovely daughter. By being a devoted family man and the biggest Costa Rica fan, he wants to make more people feel at home there. WeLoveCostaRica unites people and helps them find new home or a new travel destination. This website is a friendly community where everyone can find not only information, but also new friends and travel pals. Andrew is also passionate about IT and programming, so he himself maintains a friendly atmosphere in this cozy environment of WeLoveCostaRica.com.