Still, the labour market remains tight, with the monthly Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, or JOLTS report, from the Labor Department on Tuesday showing 1.6 vacancies for every unemployed person in March. That compared to 1.7 in February.
Fed officials, who started a two-day policy meeting on Tuesday, are closely watching this ratio. The U.S. central bank is expected to raise its benchmark overnight interest rate by another 25 basis points to the 5.00 per cent-5.25 per ent range on Wednesday before potentially pausing its fastest monetary policy tightening campaign since the 1980s.
“The decline in the ratio of job vacancies to unemployment in the last three months represents a reduction in the excess demand for labour that will be welcomed by the Fed,” said Conrad DeQuadros, senior economic advisor at Brean Capital in New York.“However, with the ratio still higher than at any time prior to November 2021, the labour market is still tight by historical standards.”Job openings, a measure of labour demand, fell 384,000 to 9.
U.S. stocks were trading lower. The dollar slipped against a basket of currencies. U.S. Treasury prices rose.Hiring was little changed at 6.1 million, keeping the hiring rate unchanged at 4.0%. Layoffs jumped by 248,000 to 1.8 million, the highest level since December 2020. The increase was led by the construction industry, which shed 112,000 positions.
The decline likely reflected the job losses in the housing market, which has been hammered by higher mortgage rates.
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