Employers plan to do more holiday hiring this year than they did in 2010, a Snagajob survey finds, but outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas forecasts no major changes from last year in retail hiring.

In the Snagajob survey, hiring managers said they expect to hire on average 4.1 seasonal workers, a nearly 5 percent increase from the average 3.9 workers hired last year. Fifty-one percent of hiring managers said they will hire seasonal workers, edging up from 50 percent who said so last year. Hourly pay will average $10.60, unchanged from last year, the survey found.

Challenger, Gray & Christmas’ annual holiday hiring forecast predicts retailers will hire roughly 627,600 seasonal workers, mirroring last year.

“We’ve got consumer confidence at a very low ebb,” said John Challenger, chief executive officer of the Chicago-based firm. “One of the first forerunners of the holiday season, which is the back-to-school season, sales were relatively flat (in August) compared to what they were in July, and we’ve got an economy that’s just not growing much at all.”

Source:  http://www.suntimes.com/business/7773327-420/holiday-hiring-might-grow-this-year.html