The number of available jobs in the US unexpectedly increased in April, new data showed Tuesday, a potential indicator that the labor market isn’t yet buckling amid broader economic concerns.
Job openings totaled an estimated 7.39 million at the end of April, up from 7.2 million in March, according to new data released Tuesday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The monthly Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey showed how the US labor market — job openings, hires, quits and separations such as layoffs — is adapting as President Donald Trump’s sweeping (and frequently shifting) policy actions kicked into higher gear in April, rattling consumers, businesses and investors alike and reigniting recession fears.
However, the data also showed that there’s not much churn happening at all, reflecting a jobs market that’s “distressingly gridlocked” as economic uncertainty and a whipsaw federal approach to tariffs have businesses frozen in their tracks, Allison Shrivastava, an economist with employment site Indeed, told CNN in an interview.
Businesses are “a bit more of deer in the headlights, not knowing what direction to take,” she said.
Economists were expecting that job openings — a closely watched measurement of labor market demand — would fall for the third consecutive month to 7.1 million, according to FactSet consensus estimates.
April’s report showed that job openings increased across most sectors, with some of the largest upswings seen in arts, entertainment and recreation; mining and logging; information; and professional and business services.
Still, some of the sharpest pullbacks in job postings were also in leisure and hospitality, with declines at restaurants, hotels, as well as other service-providing businesses.
“An increase in business services roles — which typically require somewhat longer and more dedicated planning and commitment — could indicate businesses are more confident than expected,” Shrivastava noted in commentary released Tuesday. “On the other hand, a pullback in sectors more reliant on discretionary spending, including retail and accommodation, could indicate an emerging caution on the part of consumers, which may be a signal for what’s to come.”
More ‘noise’ than signal
The unexpected increase in openings also could reflect some “noise” in the economic data, economists cautioned. Monthly data is volatile, and that’s been increasingly the case for JOLTS, which has suffered from low survey response rates.
“The numbers still show a gradually slowing, but stable, jobs market,” Robert Frick, a corporate economist with Navy Federal Credit Union, wrote in commentary Tuesday. “The leap in openings reflects normal noise in the numbers, not a surge in new positions, and the hiring rate increase isn’t a notable improvement, as that rate remains within the recent weak range.”
Despite the increase in available jobs, the rate of job openings to unemployed individuals fell to their lowest rate since December 2021, dropping to 1.06 in April, BLS data shows.
Tuesday’s report also indicated that employers also brought more people on board: Hiring activity increased to its highest rate in seven months, and the number of estimated hires (5.57 million) was the highest in nearly a year, BLS data shows.
However, despite the upticks in openings and hires, Tuesday’s report also contained some concerning indicators, notably a sharp increase in layoffs and discharges.
The number of estimated layoffs leapt higher by nearly 200,000 to 1.786 million, reversing a similarly sized drop seen in March. The rate of layoffs as a percentage of total employment, however, remains below pre-pandemic averages.
The closely watched “quits rate,” which serves as both a gauge of employee confidence as well as an indicator of future wage growth, was 2% in April, remaining above historical averages. The level of quits dropped to 3.194 million, the lowest rate seen this year.
The typical “churn” that occurs in a healthy labor market slowed through the second half of last year, which some economists attributed to factors such as inflation and high interest rates, as well as heightened uncertainty heading into the election.
That uncertainty has roared even higher in the first half of the year following Trump’s barrage of policy movers, including a whipsaw approach to tariffs.
Tuesday’s data is the first in a series of critically important economic metrics released this week about the US labor market, culminating with the Friday jobs report. Economists expect that the US economy added 130,000 jobs in May, marking a slowdown from a stronger-than-expected 177,000 in April.
In the years following the economy-upheaving pandemic, job growth has slowed, but it has not collapsed. The gains have remained solid enough to fuel consumer spending and put the economy on track for a “soft landing” of reining in inflation without triggering a recession.
The Trump administration’s frenetic trade policy and the potential for higher prices, however, have driven sentiment lower and uncertainty higher, potentially knocking the soft landing chances off the table.
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