Online posted job vacancies in February 2008 grew only 3% from the February 2007 level, according to The Conference Board Help-Wanted OnLine Data Seriesreleased this week. The 3,927,500 online advertised vacancies posted in February 2008 were up 17%, or 565,000, over January, showing an expected seasonal (post-holiday) rise. February’s rate represents 2.6 advertised vacancies posted online for every 100 persons in the labor force. February’s results reflect a continued softening in labor demand. January 2008 showed a comparatively sluggish 7% growth over January 2007.
“The softening in advertised vacancies is widespread,” says Gad Levanon, economist at The Conference Board. “For the past three months, 75 percent of states had an average annual growth rate slower than the previous year. These data, along with the drop in the Consumer Confidence Index from 112 in July 2007 to 75 in February 2008, suggest that the slow pace of labor demand observed during the last half of 2007 may even slow further in the upcoming months. If there is a bright spot, the monthly increase in February from the January level was in line with the seasonal correction expected after the holiday season.”
The National/Regional Picture
2,756,700 new online ads posted in February.
Pacific and New England Regions post a decline in annual labor demand for the fifth month in a row.
In February, 2,756,700 of the 3,927,500 unduplicated online advertised vacancies were new ads that did not appear in January, while the remainders are reposted ads from the previous month. The monthly increase of 17% in total ads and the 24% in new ads is attributable to a post-holiday seasonal correction. In spite of these increases, over-the-year (February 2007-February 2008) total ads and new ads rose only a modest 3% and 8%, respectively, the lowest annual increases posted since the series began in 2005.
The monthly national increase in advertised vacancies between January and February 2008 reflected a seasonal gain in ads in all nine census regions. Over-the-year (February 2007-February 2008), seven of the nine regions continued to show a gain in labor demand, albeit the growth rate was slower than the previous year. Two exceptions to this were New England and the Pacific region, which declined by 3% and 12%, respectively. These two were also among the regions that experienced the largest declines in consumer expectations over the last year, according to The Conference Board Consumer Confidence Survey.
The February figures reported in the Help-Wanted OnLine Data Series reflect the sum of the number of unduplicated online job ads for each day from mid-January to mid-February. This new series, which includes data from April 2005, does not have sufficient history to allow for seasonally adjusted monthly data.
State Highlights
Alaska posts the highest ads rate in the country for the sixth month in a row.
Delaware leads the nation again with the lowest supply/demand rate.
The absolute number of advertised vacancies declined from February 2007 to February 2008 in 12 states. However, looking at the pattern over the last three months, 38 states (75%) saw their average annual growth rates in online advertising significantly slow down. Most of these same states also experienced a slowing in their average annual growth rate of employment during the last year.
Alaska posted 4.7 vacancies for every 100 persons in the state labor force, the highest rate in the nation, for the sixth month in a row. Nevada (4.41) and Massachusetts (4.24) were close behind in the number of advertised vacancies when adjusted for the size of the state labor force. Fully half of the top 10 states with the largest number of ads relative to their labor force are on the East Coast and include Massachusetts (4.24), Delaware (4.22), Maryland (4.16), New Jersey (3.75) and Connecticut (3.71).
Online advertised vacancies in California, the state with the largest labor force in the nation, totaled 529,600 in February. The volume of online advertised vacancies in California was significantly above the next highest states, Texas (359,700), New York (299,500) and Florida (235,500).
“Although one cannot infer that the occupation or geographic location of unemployed persons matches the occupation or geographic location of the vacancies, looking at the number of unemployed in relation to the number of advertised vacancies provides an indication of available job opportunities for the unemployed,” says Levanon.
Using the latest unemployment data available from the Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and computing the supply/demand ratio (unemployed/advertised vacancies), the states with the most favorable (e.g., lowest) supply/demand rates included Delaware (0.89), Utah (0.95), Maryland (0.96), and Virginia (0.99). These were the only four states where the supply/demand rate was less than one, indicating that the number of unemployed workers was fewer than the number of online job ads. For the nation as a whole, the comparable supply/demand rate for January was 2.1, indicating that for every two unemployed people looking for work there was only one online advertised vacancy.
States where the number of unemployed persons looking for work significantly exceeded the number of online advertised vacancies included Mississippi (5.64) and Michigan (4.99), Arkansas (3.50), Kentucky (3.36) and South Carolina (3.19).
