Despite all the pessimism surrounding the U.S. job market at the moment, this week does offer a couple rays of hope for improvement. Firstly, a study released today by the Bureau of Labor determined that companies advertised more positions in July than they have advertised in 3 years! Employers increased their job postings from 3.17 million in June to 3.23 million in July. Many of these advertised positions are presumably still open, as it typically takes 1-3 months to fill an opening. The majority of these job openings are in energy & utilities, manufacturing, trade, and transportation.
Secondly, President Obama is scheduled to give his jobs speech tomorrow! Here’s hoping for some new, innovative ideas. Many economists agree that the best actions Washington can take to improve the job market are to extend the current payroll tax cut and long-term unemployment benefits. But Obama will likely propose other initiatives for the $300 billion jobs package he is expected to introduce. Supposedly Obama would like to increase spending on infrastructure programs, so as to create more jobs. Stay tuned for more commentary after the speech tomorrow!
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