Employers not filling jobs

This won't come as a shock to those looking for work, but the Labor Department reports that almost 3 million jobs remained open at the end of June. The number of openings was up 26 percent from June 2009, while the number of new hires was up only 5 percent. From the WSJ:

Economists, employers and job seekers offer a litany of reasons for the disconnect. Extended unemployment benefits can make people less willing to take whatever jobs are available. Some companies might try to lowball salaries. Many of the unemployed don't have the skills companies require. Housing troubles can prevent people from moving for work. Another part of the problem, said Jeff Joerres, chief executive of staffing firm Manpower, could be companies' renewed uncertainty about the economic outlook. "It's not uncommon for us to get the right person for the job and the companies still drag their feet for a month or more, just to try to get better visibility for the future and to save another month of expense," he said.

Another interesting aspect of this recession is that unemployment has been concentrated among a relatively small number of people, From NYT columnist Dave Leonhardt:

Over the course of 1980, 18.1 percent of the labor force was unemployed at some point. In 2008, the first year of this slump, only 13.2 percent was, according to the Labor Department's most up-to-date data. That number surely rose in 2009, but it is unlikely to have come close to the 1982 peak of 22 percent. If anything, the slowdown of the recovery in the last few months has made the recession even more concentrated. It has put off the day when the job market will be strong enough to re-employ many of the long-term jobless.

That helps explain why 45 percent of unemployed workers have been without a job for at least 27 weeks. That's way higher than any other downturn since World War II.