by Calculated Risk on 1/17/2014 11:16:00 AM

Update: I misread the "quits" in the report. Quits actually increased in November (ht Chris).

From the BLS: Job Openings and Labor Turnover Summary

There were 4.0 million job openings on the last business day of November, little changed from October, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. The hires rate (3.3 percent) and separations rate (3.1 percent) were unchanged in November. ...
...
Quits are generally voluntary separations initiated by the employee. Therefore, the quits rate can serve as a measure of workers’ willingness or ability to leave jobs. Layoffs and discharges are involuntary separations initiated by the employer. ... The number of quits (not seasonally adjusted) increased over the 12 months ending in November for total nonfarm and total private and was little changed for government.

The following graph shows job openings (yellow line), hires (dark blue), Layoff, Discharges and other (red column), and Quits (light blue column) from the JOLTS.

This series started in December 2000.

Note: The difference between JOLTS hires and separations is similar to the CES (payroll survey) net jobs headline numbers. This report is for November, the most recent employment report was for December.

Click on graph for larger image.

Notice that hires (dark blue) and total separations (red and light blue columns stacked) are pretty close each month. This is a measure of turnover.  When the blue line is above the two stacked columns, the economy is adding net jobs - when it is below the columns, the economy is losing jobs.

Jobs openings increased in November to 4.001 million from 3.931 million in October.   

The number of job openings (yellow) is up 5.6% year-over-year compared to November 2012 and this is the first time job openings have been above 4 million since 2008..

Quits increased (updated) in November and are up about 13% year-over-year. These are voluntary separations. (see light blue columns at bottom of graph for trend for "quits").

Not much changes month-to-month in this report - and the data is noisy month-to-month, but the general trend suggests a gradually improving labor market.  It is a good sign that job openings are at the highest level since 2008.