Today’s release of the September Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) data corroborates the story we saw in August and September’s jobs reports, as hiring slowed and the economy added a paltry number of jobs (note that the JOLTS data comes with a one-month lag relative to monthly jobs numbers, so the much-improved October jobs report data is not reflected in today’s release). Although the number of job openings increased to 5.5 million in September, this was after a large decrease to from 5.7 to 5.4 million in August. But the main data point we should focus on is the hires rate, which actually fell in September from 3.6 percent to 3.5 percent, the lowest it has been in a year.

In September, there were 1.4 active job seekers for every job opening. Although this decline is a welcome improvement in the JOLTS ratio, it is important to remember that there are still almost 8 million unemployed workers and over 3.5 million estimated “missing workers” who have left the labor force altogether because job opportunities have been so weak.

In fact, there is still a significant gap between the number of people looking for jobs and the number of job openings. The figure below shows the levels of unemployed workers and job openings. You can see the labor market improve over the last five years, as the number of unemployed workers falls and job openings rise. In a stronger economy (like the one shown in the initial year of data), these levels would be much closer together.

Meanwhile, hiring has slowed and the quits rate remains depressed. The figure below shows the hires, quits, and layoff rates through September 2015. The layoff rate was unchanged in September. While layoffs, which shot up during the recession but recovered quickly, have been at pre-recession levels for more than three years, the hiring and quits rates are recovering much more slowly. The hires rate actually fell in September, and was the lowest it’s been in over a year. The voluntary quits rate also held steady at 1.9 percent in September, continuing the trend of hovering between 1.9 and 2 since September 2014. In September, the quits rate was still 9.2 percent lower than it was in 2007, before the recession began. This is evidence that workers are stuck in jobs that they would leave if they could. A larger number of people voluntarily quitting their jobs would indicate a strong labor market—one in which workers are able to leave jobs that are not right for them and find new ones. Before long, we should see a return to pre-recession levels of voluntary quits, but we are not there yet.

Continuing a trend from last month’s JOLTS report, there does appear to be early signs of some sectoral tightening. Last year at this time, there were more unemployed workers than job openings in every sector. As you can see in the figure below, some sectors have seen improvements—notably health care and social assistance, and finance and insurance. This within-sector tightening is a small sign of good news, but other sectors have seen little-to-no improvement in their job-seekers-to-job-openings ratio. There are still, for example still 44 unemployed construction workers for every 10 constructions jobs. In other words, despite claims from some employers, there is no shortage of construction workers. (Of course, unemployed workers in one sector can sometimes find a job in a different sector, but the disproportionate numbers of job seekers in some sectors is still troubling.) In fact, while the market does appear to be improving for some types of unemployed workers, there are no significant worker shortages anywhere in the economy. Taken as a whole, these numbers demonstrate that the main problem in the labor market is a broad-based lack of demand for workers—not available workers lacking the skills needed for the sectors with job openings.

This morning’s JOLTS report, coupled with jobs reports over the summer, are evidence of a slow moving economy, with meager wage growth and employment growth that was just keeping up with the growth in the working age population. Hopefully October’s more sunny jobs outlook is a sign the economy is moving in the right direction, toward a tighter labor market in which workers can finally see real wage growth…. but we’re definitely not there yet.