US Job Openings Flat In January Vs. December’s Record

Data released on Wednesday showed there were 11.263 million job openings in the United States in January, marking a slight decline from the prior month’s upwardly revised, and record high, number, according to the labour Department.

Analysts expected the number to hold steady at December’s previously stated 10.925 million.

The phrase ‘little changed’ appears 12 times in the latest Job Openings and labour Turnover Survey for January 2022. The Job Openings and labour Turnover Survey (JOLTS), which measures labour market churn, also showed new hires remained essentially flat. And while layoffs/firings ticked higher, the quit rate slid lower.

The hires rate remains higher than the quits rate in every major industry, this indicates that when workers quit, they are taking other jobs-likely in the same sector-not dropping out of the labour force altogether.

The quit rate, a favorite indicator of erstwhile Fed chief and current Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, is often seen as a barometer of consumer expectations, as workers are less likely to walk away from a gig in times of economic uncertainty.

The JOLTS report provided another piece to the puzzle regarding the extent to which the spike in COVID infections due to the Omicron variant threw sand in the engine of the jobs market recovery, which has faced headwinds of a worker drought in recent months.