A Closer Look into April’s JOLTS Report

Job openings in the United States surged in April to a new record, with the economy showing more signs of recovery from the coronavirus pandemic.

Reopening businesses and an increased rollout of vaccines have helped economic activity create more work opportunities.

The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) showed that U.S. job openings registered 9.3 million in April, following March’s reading of 8.3 million, according to data by the Department of Labor.

The reading sets a new record level that is the highest on record since the year 2000.

Market expectations were leaning towards a reading below 8.2 million, however, the new record level exceeded expectations.

Meanwhile, job availability soared by 32.7% in the leisure and hospitality sector, which suffered the most from lockdown and preventive measures against the pandemic.

The report signals improvement in the jobs market, which is likely to continue in the coming months.

Recent media reports suggested that the high unemployment benefits provided by the government to combat the negative consequences of the pandemic might have reflected negatively on employment. Therefore, many states across are ending the pandemic unemployment benefit programs, including the additional $300 weekly checks.

So far, 25 states, half of the U.S., have already decided to cancel the additional payments by the federal government to the unemployed, which might affect as much as 2.8 million people.

April’s hiring rate stabilized at 69,000, almost compared with the month before.

On another note, the number of people quitting their jobs surged to 3.95 million, rising by 384,000, or 10.8%, raising the quits rate from 2.5% to 2.7%.

It is worth noting that the Federal Reserve is closely monitoring the jobs data to assess the progress in achieving full unemployment and making substantial further progress on the road to recovery.