Below, EPI senior economist Elise Gould offers her initial insights on today’s release of the Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) for April. Read the full Twitter thread here.

Job openings have generally been decreasing over the last year, slowly but steadily moving closer to their pre-pandemic levels, though clearly not there yet. Much of the elevated rates we’ve seen may have been because of the increased labor market churn and not net new demand. pic.twitter.com/XAYqdMNZUy

— Elise Gould (@eliselgould) May 31, 2023

Last month, it appeared that the labor market might be cooling given the rising layoffs in March, but job growth in April and the drop in layoffs in today’s report suggest the labor market remains steady and is not rapidly cooling. pic.twitter.com/vQCQhsX05u

— Elise Gould (@eliselgould) May 31, 2023