The economy may have hit some companies hard, but that’s good news for Facebook because they can hire a slew of new employees for cheap. Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook CEO, says they’re looking increase their staff by 50% and this is a great time to do so, “No one else has been hiring. It’s been a great environment for us because the economy has helped out.”

Even though he’s announced they’re looking to increase their staff, he said they’ll do so slowly, unlike other high profile companies like Google, which doubled its staff after going public in 2005. Zuckerberg also hasn’t said anything about costs or spending in the upcoming year.

Facebook currently has over 1,000 employees and over $716 million in funding, even after acquiring some companies over the past year, most recently FriendFeed for $47.5 million.

This is great news for Facebook but they’re still having trouble coming up with a solid revenue plan. They have a user base of 250 million but are still having to prove to advertisers their users will click on ads, which has proven hard for social networking sites. Whatever happens, Facebook will need to assess how much more they can spend, how they’ll allocate their spending, and ways to increase their revenue stream.

(Via Bloomberg)