Job openings unexpectedly rose by 221,000 in May to 8.1 million, reversing a downward trend, according to the monthly JOLTS report released today by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The general decline in job openings had suggested an ongoing normalization between labor supply and demand and followed the trend of falling online job postings across the U.S. After notching 9.3 million openings in September 2023, job openings fell below 9 million in the following months, dropping to 7.9 million in April.
The number of people quitting—a measure of workers' confidence in their ability to leave one job for another—rose slightly to 3.5 million. The quits rate was 2.2 percent in May, for the seventh month in a row. Layoffs in May increased by 112,000 to 1.7 million, which is consistent with the slightly elevated levels of weekly unemployment claims data.
On Friday, the Department of Labor will report on how many jobs the U.S. economy added in June, the unemployment rate and wage gains for the month.
Takeaway for employers: “Overall, the values reported in the latest JOLTS report are very similar to those reported for the prior month, continuing the theme of stability that has emerged in recent months,” said Justin Ladner, senior labor economist at SHRM. “The labor market is still very tight by historical standards, but the upheaval observed since the onset of COVID increasingly seems to have given way to a comparatively stable state in which month-to-month changes in the labor market are mild. Of course, the tightness of the labor market means that many employers will continue to struggle filling open positions; furthermore, competition among employers for scarce labor is likely to promote continued wage growth.”
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