For Immediate Release: Wednesday, October 10, 2012
Contact: Phoebe Silag or Donte Donald, news@epi.org 202-775-8810

Job-seekers ratio unchanged in August, likely dropped slightly in September

August’s Job-Seekers Ratio, the ratio of unemployed workers to job openings, declined slightly to 3.5-to-1 from the revised July ratio of 3.6-to-1, underscoring the slow-but-steady nature of the recovery. In her analysis, EPI economist Heidi Shierholz notes why today’s report does not reflect as steep a drop in unemployment as seen in last Friday’s jobs report. Because the job openings data in today’s report are for August, they do not take into account the September numbers released last Friday, she explained. However, September’s drop in unemployment means that in September the job-seekers ratio likely declined further; for example, if the number of job openings simply changed in September by the average change of the prior three months (-32,000), the job seekers ratio will have dropped to 3.4-to-1, continuing the steady improvement the ratio has been experiencing over the last three years.

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