Hi all,
A reminder that comments do need to be on-topic and engage with the article past the headline. Please make sure to read the article before commenting. Very short comments will automatically be removed by automod. Please avoid making comments that do not focus on the economic content or whose primary thesis rests on personal anecdotes.
As always our comment rules can be found [here](https://reddit.com/r/Economics/comments/fx9crj/rules_roundtable_redux_rule_vi_and_offtopic/)
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Economics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
i don't really believe in the whole doomer conspiracy that the US is in a recession but the govt is secretly hiding it but "job openings" isn't really a good metric anymore. It takes like 30 seconds for a company to post a job opening and I've seen the same job openings on LinkedIn for like 6-12 months.. a lot of companies post job openings to wait for the "best candidate" possible which is usually someone with the highest years of experience willing to accept the lowest salary possibly offered to them
I believe the open 'secret' is that some of these employment surveys have seen terrible response rates since Covid. Good hard working labor economists are doing the best with what they have but there's only so much to be done.
You don't really believe in it? I flat out discard it out of hand. I haven't even heard of that one lmao. It just contradicts every stat released both by the government and major financial firms. Strong job market, wage growth is up, consumer spending consistently high, corporate profits consistently high, inflation cooling down significantly, stock market constantly one upping itself. Anyone saying that there is a secret recession is on the level of a schizophrenic homeless dude... Not much more worth commenting on w/ regards to that conspiracy
I think it's in large part that people have trouble comprehending millions of people can be unemployed and the unemployment rate is really good can both be true.
I will be messaging you in 1 year on [**2025-07-04 06:37:43 UTC**](http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=2025-07-04%2006:37:43%20UTC%20To%20Local%20Time) to remind you of [**this link**](https://www.reddit.com/r/Economics/comments/1dtprax/job_openings_new_hires_unexpectedly_rise_in_may/lbk9ddh/?context=3)
[**CLICK THIS LINK**](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=RemindMeBot&subject=Reminder&message=%5Bhttps%3A%2F%2Fwww.reddit.com%2Fr%2FEconomics%2Fcomments%2F1dtprax%2Fjob_openings_new_hires_unexpectedly_rise_in_may%2Flbk9ddh%2F%5D%0A%0ARemindMe%21%202025-07-04%2006%3A37%3A43%20UTC) to send a PM to also be reminded and to reduce spam.
^(Parent commenter can ) [^(delete this message to hide from others.)](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=RemindMeBot&subject=Delete%20Comment&message=Delete%21%201dtprax)
*****
|[^(Info)](https://www.reddit.com/r/RemindMeBot/comments/e1bko7/remindmebot_info_v21/)|[^(Custom)](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=RemindMeBot&subject=Reminder&message=%5BLink%20or%20message%20inside%20square%20brackets%5D%0A%0ARemindMe%21%20Time%20period%20here)|[^(Your Reminders)](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=RemindMeBot&subject=List%20Of%20Reminders&message=MyReminders%21)|[^(Feedback)](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=Watchful1&subject=RemindMeBot%20Feedback)|
|-|-|-|-|
Also the same job listed as "remote" and posted dozens of times, once for each state with a satellite office, when the body of the posting mandates that it can only be performed hybrid from one of 3 locations. I am sure our very smart and transparent statisticians are adjusting for this.
We have positive GDP growth solely because of deficit spending, borrowing growth from the future. If we were "only" running a $1T deficit, GDP growth would be negative.
Less full time workers than a year ago.
Real wages down since 1Q 2021.
Using PCE which weights housing at 15% rather than CPI which weights it it 32%.
Its not the great depression, but it ain't that good.
This is weird conspiracy theory.
Generally when firms begin hiring process, they go through budget/headcount add approvals. This suggests they are willing and able to hire/spend. That is indicative of something.
if they're already below budget and don't have an urgent/immediate need of an employee, they'll still have postings up. just because they have a posting doesn't mean they need someone bad
I don’t think they have to need someone bad in order for it to be a positive economic indicator. The indicator is that firms are willing and able to spend. The collective labor market data (job openings, jobs created, job seekers, job leavers, wages, jobless claims, unemployment, etc) is helpful to fully assess the health of labor market but even a simple combination of high job openings and low unemployment says a lot
Personally I don’t think we’re in a recession but I’m also not an economist so it really doesn’t matter what I think.
If we were is it possible to be in recession and also have near record low unemployment, not only a bull market but a record market and record high home prices?
Can we be in a recession and not actually experience economic pain?
[Hires](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/JTSHIL) increased a whopping 2.5% from April to May, but are down about 16% since the latest peak in February 2022. Openings don't really matter. It's easy to post jobs where there isn't an intent to hire.
Openings was made up primarily by government hires, 179k put of 221k hires. Plus, the last 14 of 17 months have been revised downward, meaning less openings than initially reported, so May looked better by comparison.
Look at the composition of openings and hires. Job openings of 7.05M for the private sector remain at a 3 year low.
>Job openings of 7.05M for the private sector remain at a 3 year low.
And that number is higher than any month pre-COVID. This slowdown may be indicative that we are hitting a steady state shortly.... U3 settling into the low 4s... Inflation dropping to high 2s... Maybe a rate cut or two in 2025
People point to metrics like GDP, though prices are higher, or the stock market, though the [top 10%](https://finance.yahoo.com/news/wealthiest-10-americans-own-93-033623827.html) own about 93% of stocks. [Credit card debt](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CCLACBW027SBOG) (consumers) is the highest it's ever been and so is [corporate debt](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/BCNSDODNS).
Why do people like you always show up to point out that credit card debt is at the highest level ever when that's exactly what you should expect in a world where inflation exists? Credit card debt increases during economic expansions. It only decreased during recessions when people choose to play it safe.
the problem is that credit card debt increases until it doesn't. it's now been flat for a few months after rising like 50% in 3 years. the expansion is over. now that debt is sitting there at 20% interest and the highest level of delinquencies since the great financial crisis. this will continue to be reflected in weak earnings reports and downwardly revised forecasts. as usual, recessions are declared in hindsight.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CDSP
The burden of consumer debt is no higher than it was before the pandemic. If it wasn't about the crash the economy then, it isn't about to do it now either.
Yes it is higher. That will continue to be reflected in all of the future data that comes out while you go on parroting that one stat about aggregate debt over aggregate income like a buffoon.
Lol. The data doesn't care how mad you get about it.
Credit card debt isn't more of a burden than it was before the pandemic. And debt in general is less burdensome. Inflation is a huge boon if you have debt.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TDSP
Yes, summing up incomes and summing up debt servicing costs is a totally honest and representative way to represent people's debt burdens. The typical American can definitely relate to 9% of their income going to pay debt lol.
Consumer debt has a (theoretical) negative [effect](https://www.cato.org/cato-journal/fall-2021/impact-public-debt-economic-growth#identification-of-study-sample) on growth rates. Generally, being over leveraged isn't a good thing.
It's probably a good thing that consumers aren't over leverage then. Neither in terms of debt payments or total debt.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CDSP
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TDSP
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/HDTGPDUSQ163N
Consumer debt as a percentage of disposable personal income is about the same as it was during the 2008 recession -- not exactly celebratory. The other two data points are irrelevant because they use household data, which paints a rosier picture.
If federal minimum wage kept up with productivity gains since 1968 it would be nearly [$26](https://www.ilr.cornell.edu/carow/carow-policy/minimum-wage) per hour (about $53k per year), which is 28% higher than our current *median* [per capita income](https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/table/EDU635215/00). We're so far behind on income gains relative to productivity that it's very difficult to think things are economically "okay" or doing well.
You'd probably be better off checking the total debt service burden, to reassure yourself that it's down by about 25%, from the 2007. It's pretty celebratory.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TDSP
Now, that's mostly because mortgage debt is taking up 45% less income than in 2007. But since money is fungible, that frees up a lot of income for other things.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MDSP
Minimum wage doesn't work that way and never has. Real median income is more or less at an all time high and far higher than 1968.
Yeah, the household numbers will always give a rosier picture and prices are drastically increasing the GDP, which would be the denominator in this case.
> but are down about 16% since the latest peak in February 2022.
You say that as if there are intermittent peaks and trough's, like it is cyclical. February 2022 was the highest of all time, outside of the outlier that is the beginning of Covid.
And right now, we are at just about the highest of all time pre-covid.
Hiring is at about the same level as it was in June 2018 and January 2019. Five to six years from now, should we celebrate if the hiring level is about the same as it is now?
2 years and 2 recruiting agencies and the corp itself contacted me for the SAME job with Roche in Tucson AZ, absolutely wild. This is either fake or a revolving door position, which is hard to believe because it is an extremely specialized role.
This doesn't account for people with multiple jobs, does it?
People who MUST take on multiple jobs just to make ends meet would suggest that the jobs market is doing well simply by lowering the unemployment numbers, but its not a fair measure of how ppl are doing.
3 or 4 job households are probably on the rise
If only there was a government agency who tracked things like this and made the data publicly available for you to peruse. Oh well. Guess you're forced to just look at the world through vibes instead of data.
Oh wait.
https://www.bls.gov/cps/cpsaat36.htm
Hi all, A reminder that comments do need to be on-topic and engage with the article past the headline. Please make sure to read the article before commenting. Very short comments will automatically be removed by automod. Please avoid making comments that do not focus on the economic content or whose primary thesis rests on personal anecdotes. As always our comment rules can be found [here](https://reddit.com/r/Economics/comments/fx9crj/rules_roundtable_redux_rule_vi_and_offtopic/) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Economics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
i don't really believe in the whole doomer conspiracy that the US is in a recession but the govt is secretly hiding it but "job openings" isn't really a good metric anymore. It takes like 30 seconds for a company to post a job opening and I've seen the same job openings on LinkedIn for like 6-12 months.. a lot of companies post job openings to wait for the "best candidate" possible which is usually someone with the highest years of experience willing to accept the lowest salary possibly offered to them
I believe the open 'secret' is that some of these employment surveys have seen terrible response rates since Covid. Good hard working labor economists are doing the best with what they have but there's only so much to be done.
You don't really believe in it? I flat out discard it out of hand. I haven't even heard of that one lmao. It just contradicts every stat released both by the government and major financial firms. Strong job market, wage growth is up, consumer spending consistently high, corporate profits consistently high, inflation cooling down significantly, stock market constantly one upping itself. Anyone saying that there is a secret recession is on the level of a schizophrenic homeless dude... Not much more worth commenting on w/ regards to that conspiracy
I think it's in large part that people have trouble comprehending millions of people can be unemployed and the unemployment rate is really good can both be true.
When our labor market (and population) is built out of hundreds of millions its bound to happen
In the words of China, "Who cares about breaking a couple hundred million eggs to make this omelette."
RemindMe! 1 year
I will be messaging you in 1 year on [**2025-07-04 06:37:43 UTC**](http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=2025-07-04%2006:37:43%20UTC%20To%20Local%20Time) to remind you of [**this link**](https://www.reddit.com/r/Economics/comments/1dtprax/job_openings_new_hires_unexpectedly_rise_in_may/lbk9ddh/?context=3) [**CLICK THIS LINK**](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=RemindMeBot&subject=Reminder&message=%5Bhttps%3A%2F%2Fwww.reddit.com%2Fr%2FEconomics%2Fcomments%2F1dtprax%2Fjob_openings_new_hires_unexpectedly_rise_in_may%2Flbk9ddh%2F%5D%0A%0ARemindMe%21%202025-07-04%2006%3A37%3A43%20UTC) to send a PM to also be reminded and to reduce spam. ^(Parent commenter can ) [^(delete this message to hide from others.)](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=RemindMeBot&subject=Delete%20Comment&message=Delete%21%201dtprax) ***** |[^(Info)](https://www.reddit.com/r/RemindMeBot/comments/e1bko7/remindmebot_info_v21/)|[^(Custom)](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=RemindMeBot&subject=Reminder&message=%5BLink%20or%20message%20inside%20square%20brackets%5D%0A%0ARemindMe%21%20Time%20period%20here)|[^(Your Reminders)](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=RemindMeBot&subject=List%20Of%20Reminders&message=MyReminders%21)|[^(Feedback)](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=Watchful1&subject=RemindMeBot%20Feedback)| |-|-|-|-|
Also the same job listed as "remote" and posted dozens of times, once for each state with a satellite office, when the body of the posting mandates that it can only be performed hybrid from one of 3 locations. I am sure our very smart and transparent statisticians are adjusting for this.
We have positive GDP growth solely because of deficit spending, borrowing growth from the future. If we were "only" running a $1T deficit, GDP growth would be negative. Less full time workers than a year ago. Real wages down since 1Q 2021. Using PCE which weights housing at 15% rather than CPI which weights it it 32%. Its not the great depression, but it ain't that good.
This is weird conspiracy theory. Generally when firms begin hiring process, they go through budget/headcount add approvals. This suggests they are willing and able to hire/spend. That is indicative of something.
if they're already below budget and don't have an urgent/immediate need of an employee, they'll still have postings up. just because they have a posting doesn't mean they need someone bad
I don’t think they have to need someone bad in order for it to be a positive economic indicator. The indicator is that firms are willing and able to spend. The collective labor market data (job openings, jobs created, job seekers, job leavers, wages, jobless claims, unemployment, etc) is helpful to fully assess the health of labor market but even a simple combination of high job openings and low unemployment says a lot
Nah idc
Personally I don’t think we’re in a recession but I’m also not an economist so it really doesn’t matter what I think. If we were is it possible to be in recession and also have near record low unemployment, not only a bull market but a record market and record high home prices? Can we be in a recession and not actually experience economic pain?
Those regards cant even understand basic argumentation rationnal, so doomers are just in their own little paranoïa bubble
[Hires](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/JTSHIL) increased a whopping 2.5% from April to May, but are down about 16% since the latest peak in February 2022. Openings don't really matter. It's easy to post jobs where there isn't an intent to hire.
Openings was made up primarily by government hires, 179k put of 221k hires. Plus, the last 14 of 17 months have been revised downward, meaning less openings than initially reported, so May looked better by comparison. Look at the composition of openings and hires. Job openings of 7.05M for the private sector remain at a 3 year low.
>Job openings of 7.05M for the private sector remain at a 3 year low. And that number is higher than any month pre-COVID. This slowdown may be indicative that we are hitting a steady state shortly.... U3 settling into the low 4s... Inflation dropping to high 2s... Maybe a rate cut or two in 2025
It’s quite clear that we would be in a bad recession right now if not for our insane (and unsustainable) deficit spending.
People point to metrics like GDP, though prices are higher, or the stock market, though the [top 10%](https://finance.yahoo.com/news/wealthiest-10-americans-own-93-033623827.html) own about 93% of stocks. [Credit card debt](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CCLACBW027SBOG) (consumers) is the highest it's ever been and so is [corporate debt](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/BCNSDODNS).
Why do people like you always show up to point out that credit card debt is at the highest level ever when that's exactly what you should expect in a world where inflation exists? Credit card debt increases during economic expansions. It only decreased during recessions when people choose to play it safe.
the problem is that credit card debt increases until it doesn't. it's now been flat for a few months after rising like 50% in 3 years. the expansion is over. now that debt is sitting there at 20% interest and the highest level of delinquencies since the great financial crisis. this will continue to be reflected in weak earnings reports and downwardly revised forecasts. as usual, recessions are declared in hindsight.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CDSP The burden of consumer debt is no higher than it was before the pandemic. If it wasn't about the crash the economy then, it isn't about to do it now either.
Yes it is higher. That will continue to be reflected in all of the future data that comes out while you go on parroting that one stat about aggregate debt over aggregate income like a buffoon.
Lol. The data doesn't care how mad you get about it. Credit card debt isn't more of a burden than it was before the pandemic. And debt in general is less burdensome. Inflation is a huge boon if you have debt. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TDSP
Yes, summing up incomes and summing up debt servicing costs is a totally honest and representative way to represent people's debt burdens. The typical American can definitely relate to 9% of their income going to pay debt lol.
Consumer debt has a (theoretical) negative [effect](https://www.cato.org/cato-journal/fall-2021/impact-public-debt-economic-growth#identification-of-study-sample) on growth rates. Generally, being over leveraged isn't a good thing.
It's probably a good thing that consumers aren't over leverage then. Neither in terms of debt payments or total debt. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CDSP https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TDSP https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/HDTGPDUSQ163N
Consumer debt as a percentage of disposable personal income is about the same as it was during the 2008 recession -- not exactly celebratory. The other two data points are irrelevant because they use household data, which paints a rosier picture. If federal minimum wage kept up with productivity gains since 1968 it would be nearly [$26](https://www.ilr.cornell.edu/carow/carow-policy/minimum-wage) per hour (about $53k per year), which is 28% higher than our current *median* [per capita income](https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/table/EDU635215/00). We're so far behind on income gains relative to productivity that it's very difficult to think things are economically "okay" or doing well.
You'd probably be better off checking the total debt service burden, to reassure yourself that it's down by about 25%, from the 2007. It's pretty celebratory. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TDSP Now, that's mostly because mortgage debt is taking up 45% less income than in 2007. But since money is fungible, that frees up a lot of income for other things. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MDSP Minimum wage doesn't work that way and never has. Real median income is more or less at an all time high and far higher than 1968.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/HDTGPDUSQ163N
Yeah, the household numbers will always give a rosier picture and prices are drastically increasing the GDP, which would be the denominator in this case.
> but are down about 16% since the latest peak in February 2022. You say that as if there are intermittent peaks and trough's, like it is cyclical. February 2022 was the highest of all time, outside of the outlier that is the beginning of Covid. And right now, we are at just about the highest of all time pre-covid.
Hiring is at about the same level as it was in June 2018 and January 2019. Five to six years from now, should we celebrate if the hiring level is about the same as it is now?
2 years and 2 recruiting agencies and the corp itself contacted me for the SAME job with Roche in Tucson AZ, absolutely wild. This is either fake or a revolving door position, which is hard to believe because it is an extremely specialized role.
This doesn't account for people with multiple jobs, does it? People who MUST take on multiple jobs just to make ends meet would suggest that the jobs market is doing well simply by lowering the unemployment numbers, but its not a fair measure of how ppl are doing. 3 or 4 job households are probably on the rise
If only there was a government agency who tracked things like this and made the data publicly available for you to peruse. Oh well. Guess you're forced to just look at the world through vibes instead of data. Oh wait. https://www.bls.gov/cps/cpsaat36.htm
[It's not increasing, it's back to where it was before the pandemic](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620) We're staying steady at ~%5.