Abundance of Job Openings Isn’t as Scary as It Used to Be
The sturdy JOLTS report triggered renewed consternation among Fed-wary traders. But this isn’t last year’s economy.
Labor market durability is starting to become an asset rather than a liability.
Photographer: Joe Raedle/Getty Images
In financial markets, old habits die hard. The S&P 500 Index initially retreated Wednesday after a Labor Department report ostensibly showed unwanted strength in the job market. Traders feared the report would goad the Federal Reserve into another interest-rate increase next month, but that’s unlikely to be the case on its own. In fact, labor market durability is starting to become an asset rather than a liability.
The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey showed the number of available jobs in the US rose to 10.1 million in April, pushing the ratio of jobs to unemployed workers back to 1.8 — on the surface an elevated reading on a statistic that Fed Chair Jerome Powell has referenced at many of his recent press conferences. Yet a more holistic view of the labor market hints that it’s on an almost ideal trajectory given the circumstances: cooling but without entering a deep freeze.