Job openings down 50% from the peak in 2007; 6 unemployed people for every available position

Market Watch

The job opening rate fell to a record-low 1.8% in July.

Job openings track the demand for labor, the flip side of the unemployment rate, which measures the supply of labor. Read the government report.



In July, there were 6.05 unemployed people for every job opening, according to the most recent data on labor turnover. In December 2007, when the recession began, there were 1.72 unemployed people for every job opening.

The number of workers hired in July was little changed at 4.06 million, while the number of workers separated from their jobs was little changed at 4.29 million. The hires rate rose to 3.1%, while the separations rate remained at a series-low 3.3%.

In the past 12 months, hires have fallen 13.9%, while separations are down 12.8%.

Layoffs were little changed in July at 2.3 million, while 1.7 million people quit their job. Layoffs have increased 15% in the past year, while quits are down 32%.

In the 12 months ending in July, hires totaled 51.3 million and separations totaled 56.6 million, with a net job loss of 5.3 million.

I'll attest to this. My whole family is jobless and every job any one of us applies to has a ton of applicants! Sometimes 200-400 per job!

Add this with the number of unemployed and we get a very bad outlook for the future.

reply to post by Tentickles


Things do not look good, nor does it look to get better anytime in the next decade.

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I can attest to this too. The company I worked for lost a major contract to a lower-cost bid by a mega-corp that decided to enter the industry (thanks big business!). The company went from 60 people to 10 in about 4 months time, and then closed its doors during the end of Spring.

The people that I talked to about finding new jobs said they were typically up against 200-300 applicants, even for specialized fields, and the DFW job market is actually one of the more resilient markets in the nation at the moment.

Can't find a job? Make your own! Start a business, I did. While every day I come to work nervous about the future, I have a job and an opportunity that I never thought I would before, and if I can survive through this I know I can survive the future...so it's not all bad.

reply to post by Tentickles


is the world upside down or should i start drinking the kool aid. my point is if there is not enough jobs, how in the hell can the fed say this on yahoo right now under finances?


Fed Survey: Worst Recession Since 1930s Appears to Be Over- AP
A new government survey finds the vast majority of the country reporting economic activity is stabilizing or improving, as the worst recession since the 1930s appears to be over.

reply to post by tatersalad

Fed Survey: Worst Recession Since 1930s Appears to Be Over- AP A new government survey finds the vast majority of the country reporting economic activity is stabilizing or improving, as the worst recession since the 1930s appears to be over.

It is the Spin Doctors at work. How can Congress pass massive spending bills like the Health Care bill or bills that restrict the economy like Cap and Trade or the "independent farmer extermination" (Food Safety) bill or the gun control bill if people know the economy and the dollar are on very shaky ground and are about to go belly up?

I do not think they are really fooling anyone though.

I recently graduated with a degree in Network Security. Yeah, I fell into the trap that was laid for me. They all said "oh, it's a brand new field! Demand is going to skyrocket within the next three years!"

Yep. I fell for it.

Since March (I started applying two months prior to graduation) I have well over a hundred job applications in twelve cities in six different states. To date I have had ONE interview. There are so many people out of work that employers can afford to say things like "5-6 years worth of experience REQUIRED" for even entry level positions.

The one interview I had was for a large computer company. Entry level tech support. The guy asked me "how would you rate your skill level regarding computers?"

I told him, "two days ago I installed dual boot Vista/Linux on a partitioned secondary hard drive in a machine that I built from the ground up, *and* got a Linux-unsupported wireless adapter to function via command line."

"Well, that *is* impressive..blah blah blah We will inform you if you are selected for the position."

Just my luck to graduate college in the beginning of a depression. The job market out there is BRUTAL, people. Worse yet my student loan payments begin in December.

reply to post by netwarrior


Haha, I'm in pretty much the same boat. I graduated in Network Admin back in April of 08. Since then, after applying for over 100-150 positions, I had my second interview two weeks ago.

In the end, it all comes down to experience and in the current time, there is no way to get any. I too started my own business to the best of my abilities, general PC repair and maintenance. It pays about HALF of the bills each month and then the other half... well... I won't go there. I guess the credit companies are just going to have to be happy with payments every two months.

Oh well, not going to need a good credit score where we are heading.

I too can attest to this current market. My hubbie & I have been seeking work for 4 months now. He is highly qualified with over 18 years of management experience. He has been on 3 interviews. I on the other hand have been a stay at home mommy for the past 7 years so I seem to be damn well un-hireable. Which is ironic because I havent been idle in 7 years and I have many various cross skills.

Certainly enough to warrant a simple cashier job somewhere. But like everyone here is stating, Im up against a stack of other canidates. From what I have discovered, the people with an "in" are the ones who get hired, not necessarily the people with the best qualifications.

If you know someone who either works at the company or that person knows someone who works there, then your chances of getting at least an interview just increased by 50%. Companies would rather take a chance on somone who can be vouched for, rather than someone who looks great on paper.

Then of course youre competing against the other people who are at the interview because they know someone. Its like we are caught between a rock and a hard place. Wallstreet desperately needs another bubble to get the money flowing freely again. We in turn need that money flowing freely so we can, in this case, find a job. However it is all short lived because in a few years the bubble will burst and then we are back to trying to find a job again.

It is so sad that this is how our world is run. We all know there is a better way, but there is no clear 1,2,3 way to make it that way. Everyone has different ideas on how to make it better, but the "big boys" pulling the strings just laugh, and set up new ways to make us make them more money. How much money does one person need? Enough to make sure the world runs the way they want it to run.

reply to post by sylvrshadow


I can't even get a job where I once worked. (I was a temp. position last summer). I was told my some of the supervisors that they loved having me as an employee.. I know the people in that store pretty well.. Come job seeking time. Nothing. No luck with anything. I applied to it and several other stores.

The closest I got was with best buy where they were interviewing people for two straight weeks, and I got 4 interviews with 4 different people. I call several times for a week to just find something out and eventually got the message that the managers did not want to talk to me.

I should of stayed in college for the summer term. Finding a job sucks at this point, things aren't working out. Glad I have my parents at this point, without them I'd be pretty well screwed.

People need to move where the jobs are. There's a tremendous worker shortage in the DC metro area in the fields of healthcare, computers and tech, and the federal government. Such a shortage, in fact, that the state of Virginia keeps asking for more visas for Indian tech workers.
People need to take a little initiative and expand the locations of their search.