The latest JOLTS data is out. Here's a nickel summary of changes from the previous month:
- Hires are up 1.8%.
- Job openings are down 4.8%.
- Quits are up 6.6% (shows confidence about getting new job).
- Layoffs are down 2.2%.
Aside from the drop in job openings, these are decent numbers. However, the longer term trends are all negative. Over the past year, job openings are down by 2 million. Hires have dropped 0.6 million. Quits have declined by 0.5 million. And layoffs have increased by 0.2 million.
None of this means a recession is in the offing. The trends aren't that bad. But it probably does mean that the economy is visibly softening.
So, in summary:
Hires are up (good).
Job openings are down (bad*).
Quits are up (good).
Layoffs are down (good).
And your conclusion is that this report shows a softening economy.
Next you'll be telling us that this report is excellent news for John McCain.
(15-year-old reference for the McCain joke: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/all-news-is-good-news-for-mccain/)
(*I actually think that job openings are problematically high - 9.8M job openings for 6.1M unemployed people means we need to find another 3.7M workers to fill all those jobs. So I'm not really sure a decline in job openings from their current levels is all that bad. But I'll concede the point here.)
Softening relative to a year ago, yes. But as mentioned last month (or maybe it was the month before) about cherrypicking the start date, this would really be better if we could see it compared to pre-pandemic numbers and trends.
... the economy is visibly softening.
Or that it's becoming less overheated. Not really sure anyone knows which metaphor is best. But perhaps of note, the stock market sure didn't think it was cooling very much. And I don't think anyone's betting on the Fed doing anything but raising target rates this month.
(It's probably unnecessary to point out that only the stock market and people like the Fed board would consider lots of people having jobs a bad thing.)
We can parse the status of the economy by industry.
If we index total employees (100 at end of COVID recession, April 2020), we can compare different industries and find stark differences. Modify the chart to see what other industries are doing, relative to the end of the COVID recession.
I make $100h while I’m courageous to the most distant corners of the planet. Last week I worked on my PC in Rome, Monti Carlo at the long final in Paris. This week I’m back inside the USA. All I do fundamental errands from this one cool area see it. For more information,
Click on the link below… https://GetDreamJobs1.blogspot.com