US September Job Openings Hit 4-Month High While Laydowns Fall to 18-Month Low

US job openings in September exceeded expectations, reaching their highest level in four months.

Layoffs fell to their lowest level in a year and a half, raising hopes for a potential improvement in the US labor market.

According to the Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) released by the US Department of Labor on the 3rd (local time), US job openings in September were tallied at 7,523,000, an increase of 333,000 from the previous month.

This significantly exceeded the expert projection of 7,100,000 compiled by Dow Jones, marking the highest level since May.

The sectors that saw the largest increases in job openings from the previous month were professional and business services (+106,000), government (+98,000), and manufacturing (+54,000).

Actual hires also increased.

Hires in September rose by 131,000 from the previous month to 5,402,000.

Layoffs and discharges in September stood at 1,641,000, the lowest since March 2025.

The voluntary quit rate rose 0.2 percentage points from the previous month to 2.1%, the highest since September 2025.

The increase in job openings and actual hires, coupled with a decrease in layoffs, is an encouraging sign pointing to the potential recovery of labor demand.

However, determining whether the labor market is genuinely improving will likely require this trend to continue for several months.

For nearly the past three years, the US labor market has seen sluggish hiring while layoffs have remained at historically low levels.

As labor mobility within the market has been subdued, existing workers have enjoyed relatively high job security, but job seekers have faced difficulties finding new employment.

(Photo: AP, Yonhap News)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.