Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts with the label Hiring

Hiring cooled off in April - should we be worried?

U.S. companies didn't do much hiring last month. According to the Labor Department's latest report, only 160,000 jobs were added in April -- considerably fewer than the 197,000 jobs economists had anticipated. As a result, the unemployment rate stayed at 5%. This has many people worried that the U.S. economy has slowed, despite two years of strong hiring. The disappointing report adds fuel to the argument that 2016 has gotten off to a slow start. And we all know that when the U.S. economy is mired in a slump, it has serious implications for the rest of the world. I check the job boards every so often and still don't see as many positions available now -- at least not in my industry -- as in 2007, right before the recession struck.  Still, many Americans have begun looking for work in recent months, hopeful they can find better-paying opportunities. April saw a decent lift in wages -- which grew 2.5% annually -- but that's still below the 3% to 3.5% tha...