The Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey released Tuesday showed that U.S. employers reported 7.6 million open positions in April, up 731,000 from March and the highest count since May 2024. The increase surprised most forecasters, who had expected openings to decline for a third straight month to around 6.8 million.
The professional and business services sector accounted for more than 90% of the new openings, according to the survey. The data provide the first detailed look at how the labor market is responding to the U.S.-Israel-Iran war, which began in mid-March after an Israeli airstrike killed an Iranian general and triggered Iranian retaliation.
While openings surged, other indicators pointed to a cooling market. The number of workers who voluntarily quit their jobs fell to 2.98 million in April, down from 3.2 million in March and the lowest recorded since August 2020. Economists often view the quits rate as a measure of worker confidence — a decline suggests fewer employees are willing to leave their current positions for other opportunities.
Layoffs also eased, dropping to 1.7 million, the lowest in three months. Hiring activity pulled back after a strong March, with businesses adding 5.12 million workers in April, down by 419,000 hires from the previous month.
“The labor market remains mostly stable,” Matthew Martin, senior U.S. economist at Oxford Economics, said in a research note reported by CNBC. “With the quits rate and the layoff rate ticking down in April, neither employees nor employers are in a hurry to make moves.” Martin added that the Iran war could test that stability: “Weaker household spending and uncertainty are likely to influence firms’ hiring intentions.”
The report comes as the Federal Reserve continues to monitor labor market conditions for signs that inflation pressure is easing. Despite the jump in openings, the overall trend in hiring and quitting suggests employers are filling vacancies more slowly and workers are less willing to change jobs, a pattern economists described as a “low-hire, low-fire” market.