'Tis the season for holiday hiring

OAKLAND, Calif. (KTVU) - The seasonal hiring season is in full swing. If you or someone you know is looking for a seasonal job, the holiday season is awash in all manner of jobs. It's not just at a retail counter, but in support positions that are growing in leaps and bounds. 

Ian Siegel is the founder and CEO of jobs mega website ZipRecruiter.com. "Retail jobs, customer service jobs, delivery jobs and warehouse jobs." are readily available says Siegel.

The single biggest seasonal hirer this season is Amazon, which is hiring 120,000 temps. Many of the jobs are in warehouse operations and customer relations.

In retail Macy's, Walmart, Target, Kohl's, JC Penny's and Toys 'R' Us have at least 350,000 jobs up for grabs. FedEx, UPS and the U.S. Postal Service have jobs galore with almost 200,000. Last year 37% of UPS's seasonal hires became permanent employees.

ZipRecruiter's Siegel says this is the Golden Age for job seekers and job offerors, including mom and pop operations. "There is this combination of better technology online to see what positions are available. It doesn't matter whether it's a large enterprise or whether it's a small or medium sized business, those jobs get the same visibility online," says Siegel.

Plus, the so called part-time or project based "gig economy" increases the supply of such non-traditional or seasonal jobs. "What we see is that there are pockets of hiring that are seasonal by industry," says Siegel ZipRecruiter CEO.

With the number of unemployed workers dwindling, employers are keeping seasonally workers on permanently - or promising them similar jobs the next hiring season.