Has the Red-Hot Job Market Cooled Off for Good?
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Access to affordable credit helps me pay my employees, but I don't really need it. Inflation is killing me. But who cares? Big retailers are making record profits. That's why we support the Durbin Marshall credit card bill. See? Banks and credit unions help small businesses make payroll. This bill would cut the vital resources they need. While increasing megastore profits. They deserve it, don't they? Tell Congress, stop the Durbin Marshall money grab for corporate megastores. Paid for by the Electronic Payments Coalition.
Here's your Money Briefing for Friday, July 26th. I'm J.R. Whelan for The Wall Street Journal. For the past several years, job seekers held the balance of power. The fierce competition for workers allowed them to jump to new positions and collect sizable pay raises. Those looking for work in the current labor market don't have it as easy.
We've seen the number of open jobs for each unemployed person come back down to pre-pandemic levels. So it's about 1.2 open jobs per unemployed person now versus two during the peak of the red-hot job market during COVID. So the kind of crazy job market that many workers were benefiting from for several years there after COVID began has now come to an end.
Wall Street Journal economics reporter Jean Whalen will join us after the break.
Access to affordable credit helps me pay my employees, but I don't really need it. Infliction is killing me. But who cares? Big retailers are making record profits. That's why we support the Durbin Marshall credit card bill. See? Banks and credit unions help small businesses make payroll. This bill would cut the vital resources they need. While increasing megastore profits. They deserve it, don't they? Tell Congress, stop the Durbin Marshall money grab for corporate megastores. Paid for by the Electronic Payments Coalition.
What signs show the red-hot job market has cooled since the pandemic?
The once in a lifetime red hot jobs market may be over. Wall Street Journal economics reporter Jean Whalen joins me. Now, Jean, just to clear something up, you and I aren't related, right?
We are not related. We have the best, best last name on the planet, but we are not related.
OK, what changes have we seen in the labor market recently that have led us to this point?
So we've seen the unemployment rate ticking up slowly month to month to about 4.1% last month. And that's up from 3.4% early last year. We've seen the hiring rate falling below where it was before COVID. So it had soared significantly. During the pandemic, but it's now come back to earth and is about where it was before COVID. And we've seen the number of open jobs for each unemployed person come back down to pre-pandemic levels as well. So it's about 1.2 open jobs per unemployed person now versus before. to during the peak of the red hot job market during COVID. So several measures have come down and shown that the kind of crazy job market that many workers were benefiting from for several years there after COVID began has now come to an end.
You've spoken to a lot of job seekers. How have these changes affected them?
I spoke particularly with white-collar workers, and quite a few of them were saying that they're having a tough time. Now, of course, I was speaking to job seekers, and so they are naturally without a job and looking for one. So that's always going to be probably a frustrating experience. Some of them were saying it's taking longer this time around than it has in years past to find something new. People in the human resources profession seem particularly frustrated.
How have unemployment and job-openings ratios changed recently?
Many of them had really great job prospects starting around 2021, 2022, because a lot of companies were snapping up HR people so that those HR people could then... try to hire as many workers as they could because a lot of companies were just desperately scrambling for workers during the big labor shortage. And when things started to slow down, a lot of companies jettisoned their HR people first and stopped hiring HR people. So those folks are having a hard time. Other white collar workers also are having kind of a hard time finding work at the moment.
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