Job openings rose 181,000 in December to 5.03 million, the most since January 2001, from a revised 4.85 million the month before, the Labor Department reported Tuesday in Washington. The number of Americans hired advanced to a seven-year high.
An increase in the number of people who voluntarily quit their jobs signals greater optimism about finding work elsewhere as stronger demand prompts a pickup in job listings. The figures, among those used by Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen and her colleagues, keep the central bank on track to raise interest rates later this year.
“The fact that you have so many new jobs coming on the market shortens the time that individuals have to spend in unemployment, between jobs,” said Lou Crandall, chief economist at Wrightson ICAP LLC in Jersey City, New Jersey. Crandall is the second-best forecaster of job openings over the last two years, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
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