It's not your imagination: It's truly tougher to get a job.
Labor Department data released today show that there were 6.1 unemployed workers in December, on average, for every available position, the Associated Press reports.
That's a sharp increase from 3.4 jobless workers per job opening the same month a year earlier. In December 2007, when the recession began, the figure was 1.7 jobless workers per opening.
There were 2.5 million jobs available nationwide at the end of December, down from 3.2 million a year earlier, the Labor Department data show.
Still, today's report isn't all bleak. The number of available jobs increased by about 60,000 from November. And December's ratio of 6.1 unemployed workers per job was an improvement from November's 6.3, the highest on records dating from 2001, the Associated Press reports.
Assistant Business Editor Alan M. Wolf joined the N&O in 1999 covering the business of health care. He became an editor in 2001, and helps oversee the paper's daily business coverage and Sunday Work&Money section. He lives in Clayton with his wife and two children. Reach him at 919-829-4572 or
Comments
fewer jobs,more job seekers
Tue, 02/09/2010 - 22:14 — henryeHow can there be jobs here when the trade deficit was at $108 billion dollars in the 3rd quarter of 2009. not to mention all the nine previous years ranging from about 3 to 6oo billion dollars each quarter . that is our money going overseas. and to add insult to injury, the previous job stimulus package to stimulate jobs here went to China.
one Senator who said they wanted language in the bill to limit it to jobs here . was told the Obama administration did not want that language in the bill.. one can assume that Obama was elected by the same Big Business money as Bush, and Clinton.
the president keeps saying
Tue, 02/09/2010 - 21:12 — TracyWthe president keeps saying that things are improving; why do you keep complaining? Last quarter the GDP rose so that means we are out of the woods and into the pasture. Ignore the fact that the GDP went up due to inventory
Everybody's a critic
Tue, 02/09/2010 - 19:00 — SeafeverI think Wolf has done some nice work here, breaking this down to
palatable numbers--now you know how many others, on average, are competing
with you when you get an interview. The best man wins.
Hows that Hope & Change and
Tue, 02/09/2010 - 16:42 — PhantomLordHows that Hope & Change and "Jobs" Governor working out for ya?
Perdue is supposed to singlehandedly reverse a global recession?
Tue, 02/09/2010 - 18:33 — BradleysCreekThe one that 30 years of deregulatory Reaganomics got us into?
The tax rate on the wealthiest Americans was at its highest during those golden 1950s and 1960s to which the conservatives always want to return, and our national economic well-being was at its peak on multiple measures.
But don't let little facts like these get in the way of the tea party brainwashing, though.
Thanks for that great insight
Tue, 02/09/2010 - 15:14 — bu11durm"It truly is tougher to get a job."
We've been in a recession for quite a while now. Unemployment is up in double-digits; real unemployment is up near 17%.
And you just now figured out it's tougher to find a job?!?!