The number of hires fell by 198,000 to 5.1 million in April, a 3.7% decrease. No single hiring indicator is definitive, but this is a comforting report.
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Job openings edged up 2 percent from March to 5.8 million, matching the highest on record since 2000.
The government’s latest release on the USA labor market offered fodder for pessimists and optimists alike, with the number of Americans opting to quit their jobs holding near pre-recession levels. That “suggests that firms may be having difficulty in finding qualified employees in a tightening job market”, Drew Matus, an economist at UBS Securities LLC, wrote on Wednesday.
Job openings at companies Stateside returned to their highest level of the current economic cycle in April, leading some, but not all, analysts to conclude that any lull in employment growth would be short-lived.
The number of job openings was little changed in all four regions. “By the time of the September meeting, we expect the quit rate – which just moves inversely with the unemployment rate – will have risen again”. “At some point, they may have to pay more for those workers”.
The rate of total separations-including quits, layoffs and discharges, and other separations-closed the month with a seasonally adjusted 5.1%, up 10 basis points from March and up 40 basis points from last April.
But that’s still a ton of job openings.
King concurred, while calculating a 15 percent drop in corporate profits since their peak in the third quarter of 2014. The ugly numbers even made Yellen tone down talk of a June rate hike.
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Still, all this comes after last week’s brutal jobs report. On one hand, job growth appears to be slowing down.
