Ibec has welcomed the increase in the number of people at work but warned further employment growth could lead to labour shortages here with policy changes needed to address that. Employment levels have now grown for 25 consecutive quarters. "For the past few years, skills shortages within certain sectors were the main challenges facing the Irish labour market. However, with unemployment now close to pre-crisis levels, these skills shortages will soon turn into labour shortages. This will cause employment growth to slow as firms will find it harder to fill vacancies.

Source: Evening echo November 20, 2018 16:41 UTC