The economy is still adding plenty of new jobs almost nine years after the end of the Great Recession.
The numbers
The number of job openings in the U.S. surged in March to a record 6.55 million from 6.1 million, showing companies are still eager to add workers with the economy growing soundly almost nine years after the last recession.
What happened
Professional and white-collar job openings climbed by 112,000. Postings for construction jobs rose by 68,000. And openings for transportation and warehousing work increased by 37,000.
About 5.4 million people were hired and 5.3 million lost their jobs in March, the Labor Department reported.
The share of people who left jobs on their own, known as the quits rate, was 2.5% among private-sector employees. That matches a post-recession high. It was 2.3% for all workers. People quit their jobs when they are more confident of finding a better one — typically a sign of a very strong labor market.
Big picture
How good is the jobs market now?
Here’s the positive view. The number of unemployed Americans per job opening fell to a record low of 1.01. In other words, there’s only one person without a job for each job available in the U.S. The rate of unemployed workers to job openings peaked at 6.7 at the end of the Great Recession.
Looked at more pessimistically, companies only hired 5.4 million workers in March even as they advertised 6.55 million openings, noted Moody’s Analytics. That suggests firms are struggling to find qualified workers or that they don’t feel a pressing need to fill open positions.
Whatever the case, the economy is still adding plenty of new jobs. In April, the U.S. created a net 164,000 jobs and the unemployment rate dropped below 4% for the first time since December 2000.
With jobs plentiful, more Americans are entering or reentering the workforce, and that’s helping to extend one of the longest expansions in U.S. history.
The Federal Reserve, for its part, views the labor market as so hot that the central bank might feel compelled to raise interest rates more aggressively if not for the surprisingly paucity of wage gains for workers. Worker pay still isn’t rising fast enough to trigger an inflationary alarm.
What they are saying?
The record report on job openings “adds to the red-hot labor market story that will keep the Fed focused on further interest rate increases and the markets eyeing rising inflation expectations,” said Scott Anderson, chief economist of Bank of the West.
Latest comments