By many measures, including impact on the economy, the pandemic has been devastating. But for job hunters, the prospects looked a lot worse during the Great Recession.
In June, according to federal data released Monday, there were three unemployed people for every job opening in the U.S. That was down from 3.9 in May and 4.6 in April, an improving trend that tracked the reopening of much of the economy.
Even at their worst, these numbers don’t rival those from the second half of 2009, when the U.S. was mired in a deep recession. At that time, over six unemployed people were competing for every job opening. And the ratio remained high for years, not falling to 3-to-1 until early 2013.
At the time, job hunters often complained about the tough labor market, saying companies were looking for “a purple squirrel.” That was a metaphor for a job candidate with an unworldly mix of experience, skills and pay history. In other words, employers wanted applicants who didn’t exist.
Today, many companies have said they can’t get workers to return, either because they’re afraid of being exposed to COVID-19 or they don’t want to give up unemployment benefits, which had included an extra $600 a week from the feds.
The number of job openings remains high by historical standards. At the end of June, there were 5.9 million openings, on par with monthly averages in 2015, ’16 and early ’17. That’s also more than double the monthly openings during the 2009 recession.
That sounds promising for the unemployed, but a local economist warns against reading too much into the data.
“Because of what’s going on, I’m not sure what it tells us,” said Cheryl Abbott, a regional economist in Dallas for the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. “These job openings may be on the books at a company, but a month from now, that company may be outta business.”
The big risk, of course, is the pandemic. No one can tell, she said, whether a community may have to shut down parts of its economy again.
“So expect it to be volatile,” Abbott said about the labor market.
At the moment, there’s strong demand for workers in restaurants and hotels. In July, the leisure and hospitality industry added over half a million jobs, more than any sector.
In June, food and lodging companies reported 719,000 openings, the equivalent of 6.4% of its worker base. That’s higher than the 4.1% openings rate for all industries, and higher than the rate from a year ago.
“It’s essentially back to where it was before the pandemic,” Abbott said about demand for those workers.
That’s not the case in some other large industries, including professional and business services, health care and retail trade.
“There are fewer good jobs, but they are out there,” said Allison Harding, senior director of career and financial services at the Jewish Family Center of Greater Dallas.
For high-wage earners, she said, “The jobs are not there in the numbers they used to be.”
Her colleague, career coach Mitch Jacobs, said he helped a financial manager in his 60s, who was pursuing work for five months. Ultimately, he accepted a contract position paying about $40,000 less per year, Jacobs said.
The $600 in federal unemployment payments ended in July, and lawmakers are working on an extension and negotiating the dollar amount. That’s helped many families pay the bills, but Harding said it’s been a disincentive for applicants who would typically consider low-paid work.
The current downturn is much different than the Great Recession, said Robert Dye, chief economist at Comerica Bank. In 2009, a financial crisis spurred the problems, not a pandemic. And male blue-collar workers in manufacturing and construction faced some of the deepest job cuts.
This time, it appears that women in low-paid services, especially women of color, are bearing more of the brunt of the damage.
“There’s also less certainty coming out of this,” Dye said. “We’re still very much at the mercy of the coronavirus pandemic.”
Because of widespread shutdowns in the spring, the economy and jobs contracted deeply — and bounced back fast, too. They just haven’t recovered nearly what they lost.
“From this point forward, we’re not gonna see that huge improvement,” he said, referring to the unemployment rate dropping from 14.7% in April to 10.2% in July.
From March through June, 33.6 million people lost or quit their jobs, according to the BLS. During the same time, companies hired 23 million people, including 6.7 million in June.
Dye is concerned about people putting off purchases for a while — and putting off other spending for good. Auto sales plunged in April and have been rising since. In July, they hit a rate of 15 million a year, but that’s still well shy of its recent rate of 18 million annually.
“My word for the fall is ‘choppy,’” Dye said. “There’s gonna be a lot of uncertainty and second-order effects working through the system.”
His advice to those who aren’t working? Assess their individual situation and give special consideration to their health, home region, industry and career arc.
“Some will need to take any job they can get, and others can afford to be more particular,” Dye said. “No one size fits all in this recession.”
