Job openings in April remain near record highs, U.S. employers report

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2022/06/01/jolts-job-quits-april/

4.4 million Americans quit or changed jobs, new Labor Department figures show
By Abha Bhattarai
June 1, 2022 at 10:03 a.m. EDT


Job openings remain near record highs with 11.4 million job openings, as the tight labor market continues to be a bright spot for the U.S. economy.

Some 4.4 million Americans quit or changed jobs in April, according to a report released Wednesday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, using their leverage in a labor economy where job openings continue to outnumber job seekers by close to two-to-one.

Employers reported hiring 6.6 million people in April. Layoffs, meanwhile, fell to an all-time low of 1.2 million, as businesses sought to keep the workers they did have.

“The labor market remains strong even though things are cooling off a bit,” said Nick Bunker, an economist at the jobs site Indeed. “We’re still very much in a worker’s and job-seeker’s market.”

The latest figures come as the U.S. job market notches month after month of solid growth. U.S. employers added 428,000 jobs in April — the 12th consecutive month of at least 400,000 new jobs. The unemployment rate is at a pandemic low of 3.6 percent.


In all, the labor market has added more than 6.5 million jobs in the past year and is on pace to return to pre-pandemic levels this summer. That brisk growth has empowered millions of workers to leave dissatisfying jobs.