Biden's America: A Record Number of Americans Just Quit Their Jobs
As the Biden administration attempts to paint a rosy picture on the economy and jobs market, a record number of Americans quit their jobs in September, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics announced Friday.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics’ monthly Job Openings and Labor Turnover Summary showed that more than 4 million people voluntarily left their jobs during the final month of the third quarter.
“In September, the number and rate of total separations were little changed at 6.2 million and 4.2 percent, respectively,” the report said. “The number of quits increased in September to a series high of 4.4 million (+164,000). The quits rate also increased to a series high 3.0 percent.”
Industries that saw the largest share of resignations were arts, entertainment and recreation, the report said.
Ben Casselman of The New York Times broke down the report on Twitter.
Notable that quits are especially elevated (relative to prepandemic levels) in leisure and hospitality — a sector where there is strong demand and significant wage growth, but also where understaffing may be making these jobs especially miserable right now. pic.twitter.com/AdRVu7on1K
— Ben Casselman (@bencasselman) November 12, 2021
The number of hires for every open job ticked up slightly in September, but only because of the drop in openings, not because of increased hires. And hiring remains extremely hard by historical standards. pic.twitter.com/uVfFOVYBEg
— Ben Casselman (@bencasselman) November 12, 2021
Hospitality and retail are having a hard time hiring right now, but notable that hiring is even tougher in education. (Mining and logging is the highest, but it’s a small sector so lots of volatility there.) pic.twitter.com/XEvfjIMbsa
— Ben Casselman (@bencasselman) November 12, 2021
September’s record 4.4 million quits edged out August, the previous record-holder for a month in which people had left their jobs voluntarily at 4.3 million.
The rate at which people left their jobs in September also broke a 21-year record, Bloomberg reported.
“The quits rate, or the number of quits in the month as a percent of total employment, increased to 3% in September, also a record in data back to 2000,” Bloomberg economy editor Molly Smith noted.
At the end of September, 10.4 million jobs were open nationwide as businesses struggled to find workers.
The report from the BLS came as the White House has attempted to portray the jobs market and the economy as healthy while downplaying or outright ignoring soaring inflation.
On Monday, President Joe Biden’s Twitter account celebrated a 4.6 percent unemployment rate.
From the creation of over 5.6 million jobs to the unemployment rate reaching a pandemic-low of 4.6%, America is getting back to work.
And thanks to the American Rescue Plan, we’ve managed it two years sooner than forecasters predicted we could.pic.twitter.com/uw4GWPYoCw
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) November 9, 2021
The account bragged that Americans were “getting back to work.”
Today, we learned that we have had six consecutive weeks of decline in new unemployment claims. Unemployment claims are down 70% since I took office and falling at the fastest rate since the 1950s.
America is getting back to work.
— President Biden (@POTUS) November 10, 2021
The White House had not commented on the September Job Openings and Labor Turnover Summary on Friday morning.
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