Bloomberg
(Bloomberg) -- Job openings climbed to a 14-year high in February, indicating companies are optimistic about the prospects for sales and the U.S. economy after a recent setback.
The number of positions waiting to be filled climbed by 168,000 to 5.13 million, the most since January 2001, a report from the Labor Department showed Tuesday. Dismissals dropped to the lowest level since November 2013.
More employment opportunities in February, led by construction companies, retailers and restaurants, indicate the labor market probably will keep improving after a slowdown in March hiring. A drop in the number of Americans who quit their jobs shows faster wage growth may still take time to develop.
“Firms are indicating they're happy to hire,” said Thomas Costerg, an economist at Standard Chartered Bank in New York, who projected 5.07 million openings. “They're looking through the current softness and seeing some bright times ahead. It bodes well for future payrolls growth.”
Stocks rose, after the biggest gain for equities in a week. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index climbed 0.4 percent to 2,088.75 at 12:32 p.m. in New York.
The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, or JOLTS, adds context to monthly payrolls data by measuring dynamics such as resignations, help-wanted ads and the pace of hiring. Though it lags the Labor Department's other jobs figures by a month, Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen follows the report to gauge labor-market tightness and worker confidence.
In that regard, the JOLTS data were mixed. While more jobs are being listed by companies and dismissals declined, the report also showed fewer Americans quit their jobs, indicating they were a little less confident about finding a new one.
Some 2.69 million people voluntarily left their jobs in February. That was down from 2.78 million the prior month, which was the highest since April 2008. The quits rate fell to 1.9 percent from 2 percent, which was the reading when the recession started in December 2007.
“Measures of job turnover, which tend to lead wage acceleration, were disappointing,” Jeremy Schwartz, an economist at Credit Suisse in New York, said in an e-mail to clients. “The rate of job quits declined slightly from its post-crisis highs and has been stagnant for nearly five months.”
The report also showed the number of people hired fell to 4.92 million from 4.99 million, keeping the hiring rate at 3.5 percent. The gauge calculates the number of hires during the month divided by the number who worked or received pay during that period.
Payrolls climbed by 126,000 in March following a 264,000 gain a month earlier that was smaller than initially reported, the Labor Department reported Friday. The smaller advance broke a yearlong string of monthly gains in employment exceeding 200,000, which was the longest such stretch since 1995.
“One month doesn't make a trend,” Heidi Shierholz, chief economist at the Labor Department, said in a telephone interview. “I don't see any reason to think we've departed from the longer trajectory of solid growth in the labor market.”
Dismissals, which exclude retirements and those who left their job voluntarily, decreased to 1.59 million, the fewest since November 2013, from 1.72 million a month before.
January job openings were revised to 4.97 million. The median forecast in a Bloomberg survey projected 5.01 million listings in February after a previously reported 5 million the month before.
The latest figures indicate there are about 1.7 unemployed people vying for every opening, matching the lowest level since November 2007.
The increase in job openings is giving some Americans the chance to earn more. Sean Sidders, who began late February as a marketing specialist at Two Men And A Truck, said it wasn't hard to switch from the advertising agency where he'd worked for just over a year. His job at the moving services company pays about 10 percent more, and will bring relief from a two-hour commute.
“There were a lot of jobs out there, but I wanted one where I could be more in charge of what I was doing,” said the 23-year old resident of Pasadena, California, where his employer is opening a new office. “It feels good to have this.”
Federal Reserve Bank of New York President William C. Dudley, in a speech Monday, said he'll be trying “to determine whether the softness in the March labor market report evident on Friday foreshadows a more substantial slowing in the labor market than I currently anticipate.”
He said slow first-quarter growth largely reflected temporary conditions, including unusually harsh winter weather.
Some measures of slack on Yellen's job-market radar are still not back to pre-recession health. A gauge of underemployment, which includes those working part-time who'd take a full-time position if one were available, was 10.9 percent in March and compared with 8.8 percent in December 2007, when the last recession began.
Fed policy makers are monitoring progress in the labor market to help determine when to begin raising interest rates for the first time since 2006.
Hiring gains that lead to a pickup in wages will help to accelerate consumer spending, which accounts for almost 70 percent of the economy.
Gross domestic product may have expanded at a 1.5 percent annualized pace, according to the median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of economists, after growing at a 2.2 percent rate in the final quarter of 2014.
Household consumption barely rose in February as cold weather kept some shoppers away from malls. Recent figures indicate a turnaround. Motor vehicle sales rose in March to a 17.1 million annualized rate, matching the strongest pace since August, Ward's Automotive Group data show.
A pickup in consumer spending would help make up for weakness in other parts of the economy. Manufacturing expanded in March at the slowest pace in almost two years, restrained by a stronger dollar, weaker foreign demand, a plunge in oil prices and lingering delays in shipments from West Coast ports.
More seasonable weather, high consumer confidence and a healthier housing market may signal a pickup in growth and payroll gains.
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