The Greatest Resignation

A record 4.54 million people voluntarily quit their jobs in March, per the Labor Department’s latest Job Openings and Labor Turnover report released yesterday, up from 4.35 million people the month before.

📝 By the numbers…

• Quits are at record highs in leisure and hospitality, construction, and manufacturing.
• There are currently 5.6 million more jobs than unemployed workers, accounting for an all-time high of 3.4% of the labor force. (Put another way, there are now two jobs available for every unemployed worker.)
• Job openings increased in the South but fell in the Northeast, Midwest and West.

☝️ One interesting thing: A recent report from the ADP Research Institute, which surveyed more than 32,000 workers in November 2021, found 64% of the global workforce have already, or would consider, looking for a new job if their employer wanted them back in the office full-time.

📸 The big picture: Job openings surged to record highs throughout 2021 and have since stabilized at levels nearly twice as high as the pre-pandemic norm. Yet the number of Americans looking for work recovered at a much slower clip, leaving the labor market with a massive gap between supply and demand that's persisted into 2022, Business Insider reports.

📈 Zoom out: The Fed is expected to raise interest rates by half a percentage point later today.