New York, January 4, 2007--In December there were 3,344,600 online advertised vacancies, a rise of 17 percent from last December, according to the Conference Board Help-Wanted OnLine Data Series.
While this number is up from last year, it was down by 366,700, or 10 percent from the November level, mostly due to a downward seasonal pattern which began with the Thanksgiving holiday. There were 2.2 advertised vacancies online for every 100 persons in the labor force in December. The monthly decrease in advertised job vacancies was reflected in 49 of the 50 states and was widespread across most major metropolitan areas.
"The period between Thanksgiving and the end of the year is typically slow in terms of hiring, so it's not surprising that we saw a decline in the number of job ads last month," said Gad Levanon, economist at The Conference Board. "While the economy slowed down in 2006, all in all weaknesses in the labor market have not been widespread. Advertised vacancies actually grew during the year and unemployment edged lower. Over the year people observed that employment opportunities became more plentiful, according to our Consumer Confidence survey."
The Conference Board introduced its newly redesigned Help Wanted Online Data Series (HWOL) with the release of the October 2006 data. The HWOL program is now one of the earliest released economic indicators for the previous month. Geographic coverage has been expanded and now provides detailed monthly data on labor demand (vacancies) for the U.S., the 9 Census regions, the 50 States, and 52 of the largest metro areas. Information for Total Ads has been introduced along with the already existing New Ads data. Economic analysis in the release has been broadened to include both labor supply (unemployment) and labor demand (vacancies); in addition, the program has been expanded to include geographic occupational detail on labor demand along with occupational pay levels.
The underlying data for The Conference Board HWOL are provided by Wanted Technologies, Inc. Financial support for this series is provided by CareerBuilder.com.
The 3,344,600 unduplicated online advertised vacancies in December include 2,101,400 new ads that did not appear in November, as well as reposted ads from the previous month. During December, total ads fell 10 percent and new ads fell 12 percent from the previous month. Over the year (December'05 — December'06) total ads and new ads rose 17 percent and 24 percent, respectively.
While this series does not have a sufficiently long history to allow for seasonal adjustment, the monthly decrease of 366,700 in total ads is consistent with seasonal declines in other labor market indicators, and was widespread across the nation. Monthly percent change declines were greatest in the New England, West North Central, and South Atlantic regions. States with the largest declines were Florida (-35,600), New York (-22,000), Massachusetts (-20,000), Pennsylvania (-17,600) and Minnesota (-7,700). Major metropolitan areas contributing to these declines were Boston (-15,900), New York (-15,200), Washington, D.C. (-12,500), Miami (-11,200), and Philadelphia (-7,000).
North Dakota, the only state to post an increase this month, inched up 300 ads from last month. The two metro areas for which data is reported separately that posted an increase were Virginia Beach (+2,100) and San Jose (+400).
