Job openings data falls to levels rarely seen since pandemic

Job openings ticked down in July to ranges not often seen for the reason that Covid-19 pandemic, bolstering fears of cooling within the labor market.

The Job Openings and Labor Turnover report confirmed round 7.18 million listings in July, based on knowledge from the Bureau of Labor Statistics launched Wednesday. That is solely the second studying below the 7.2 million stage for the reason that finish of 2020.

Wednesday’s print was the bottom since September 2024, when simply greater than 7.1 million openings had been reported. Outdoors of that blip decrease final yr, these job opening ranges had been final seen when the pandemic was inflicting an upheaval of the U.S. economic system and labor power.

It additionally got here in beneath expectations for 7.4 million openings from economists polled by Dow Jones.

That underscored rising considerations of weakening within the labor market, a pattern that has proven up in anecdotal proof for a number of months.

“It is a turning level for the labor market,” mentioned Heather Lengthy, chief economist at Navy Federal Credit score Union. “It is yet one more crack.”

“That is yet one more knowledge level underscoring how this job market is frozen and it is tough for anybody to get a job proper now,” Lengthy added.

Weekly jobless claims knowledge due on Thursday will provide the subsequent spherical of perception into the well being of the job market. Then, consideration turns to the carefully adopted jobs report Friday morning.