South By North Strategies, Ltd.

From the Economic Policy Institute’s analysis of the January version of the Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) …

The total number of unemployed workers in January was 12.8 million (unemployment data come from the Current Population Survey). Therefore the ratio of unemployed workers to job openings was 3.7-to-1 in January, unchanged from the revised December ratio of 3.7-to-1. Notably, despite steady improvements since its peak of 6.7-to-1 in July 2009, this ratio is still far higher than thehighest rate of the early 2000’s downturn, which was 2.9-to-1. Furthermore, the lack of job openings relative to job seekers is not limited to particular industries….