Labor market shifts in depth
Instead of chasing the trend of expanding recruitment at all costs, many businesses have chosen a difficult path when proactively investing in technology, restructuring the labor force and upgrading skills for existing personnel.
Ms. Bui Yen Chi - representative of Horn Vietnam Co., Ltd. (An Duong, Hai Phong) - said that in the past 5 years, the factory used about 3,500 workers, but now, with the same output, the business only needs 1,500 - 2,000 workers. The reason is that many manual stages have been replaced by automatic machines, helping to reduce dependence on unskilled labor.
Reality shows that when automation is promoted, output and orders do not decrease but increase, scale expands in depth instead of just increasing the number of workers" - Ms. Chi stated clearly.
Currently, the automation rate at this enterprise is about 30-50% and is expected to increase to 60-70% by 2026.
The demand for human resources is still increasing by about 30-40%, but it is a new demand: skilled technicians who know how to operate machines and are able to use 2 foreign languages" - Ms. Chi said.
2025 closes with the recovery momentum of the labor market. However, the quality of human resources is still low compared to many countries in the region, and supply-demand imbalances are common, requiring comprehensive solutions for more sustainable development in 2026.
According to statistics from the Ministry of Home Affairs, in 2025, the labor force reached about 53.2 million people. The unemployment rate in the working age group is 2.22% (down 0.03% compared to the previous year); the unemployment rate in the working age group is 1.65% (down 0.34 percentage points compared to the same period last year).
Positive employment picture
Talking to Lao Dong Newspaper, Dr. Nguyen Quoc Viet - Deputy Director of the Vietnam Institute for Economic and Policy Research (VEPR) - said that from the perspective of aggregate demand, the flow of social investment capital has grown positively, notably private investment capital. If previously private enterprises mainly focused on services, real estate, tourism, retail or agricultural products, 5 years later it has witnessed a clear shift to key sectors such as infrastructure construction, manufacturing industry, steel, mechanics, automobiles, and machinery manufacturing.
The trend of structural shift will lead to a large recruitment demand for highly qualified, skilled and skilled workers, and is also compatible with the shift of foreign direct investment (FDI) capital into Vietnam in recent years.
Vietnam's total registered FDI capital in 2025 exceeded the threshold of 38 billion USD, the highest realized capital in 5 years, while import and export turnover approached the 930 billion USD mark, reflecting the resurgence of the manufacturing - export sector and the increasingly clear role of FDI in economic growth and international integration.
The synergy between large projects of domestic private enterprises, the expansion of production of the FDI sector and the process of shifting the high-tech supply chain into Vietnam has created a positive job picture, especially skilled and qualified workers in fields such as machine manufacturing, electronics, precision mechanics, electronics and telecommunications, and information technology" - Mr. Viet analyzed.
According to Mr. Viet, the digital transformation process and the development of e-commerce and logistics also open up many new job opportunities. Workers trained in the fields of digital economy, digital media, e-commerce and social networking platforms are forecast to have positive job prospects.
