Job openings rose to the highest level on record in April, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Tuesday.
Total advertised vacancies rose to just above 6 million, eclipsing last summer’s highs to reach the highest level since the bureau began counting openings in 2000.
Record-high openings is a good sign for the economy and another indication that the jobs recovery still has steam in its seventh year.
Tuesday’s numbers come from the bureau’s Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey. The report is released on a one-month lag from the more widely-cited payroll jobs report, but is valued by government officials and investors because it contains details about gross hiring and layoffs.
In April, there were just 1.2 unemployed workers for every advertised job vacancy, below pre-crisis levels.
While openings soared in April, actual hiring fell from 5.3 million to 5.1 million and has barely budged on the year. Slower hiring at this stage of the recovery, however, may reflect that businesses are having a hard time finding available workers, rather than a lack of jobs.
Nearly twice as many people quitting as getting laid off. In tight labor market, workers more confident they’ll find another job. #JOLTS pic.twitter.com/vVIfN2CGez
— Jed Kolko (@JedKolko) June 6, 2017
The monthly payroll jobs reports from April and May back up that assessment. The economy created 174,000 net jobs in April, and 138,000 in May, according to the bureau. Only about 50,000 to 100,000 jobs are needed to keep the unemployment rate trending down. At 4.3 percent in May, unemployment is already below where officials at the Federal Reserve thought it would settle in a fully healthy economy.
