July's Job Openings and Labor Turnover Summary showed that while U.S. employers did more hiring than in any month in history and job openings increased to 6.6 million, the labor market is still struggling.
What's happening: There were 708,000 more hires than separations, a strong number but more than a million below the nonfarm payrolls estimate of 1.73 million jobs added for the month. It was, however, less than the more than 2 million job differential seen in June.
What we're hearing: "You’re seeing a rebound that's been stronger than anything we’ve seen historically but we’ve never been trying to dig out of a hole quite this deep," Stephen Bronars, a labor economist and partner at Edgeworth Economics, tells Axios.
- "Rather than looking at year-over-year comparisons, you have to look at how many jobs have been lost and how many of those have come back."
By the numbers: Nearly 21.5 million Americans lost their jobs in March and April and only around half of those jobs have returned.
- The latest Bureau of Labor Statistics data show around 141 million employed in the U.S., compared to 152.5 million in February.
- Both the labor force participation rate, at 61.7%, and the employment to population ratio, at 56.5%, are historically low and well below their levels in February.