Job Market Cools Dramatically: October Openings Plunge to 101.9—Lowest Since Feb 2021

US labor market hits the brakes—hard.

Job openings cratered to just 101.9 last month, marking the weakest reading since the post-pandemic hiring frenzy began. Employers are slamming the door shut faster than a crypto exchange during a flash crash.

What’s driving the drop?

• Fed rate hikes finally biting?
• Corporate cost-cutting frenzy?
• Or just Wall Street’s favorite game—‘beat estimates by lowering expectations’?

Either way, the ‘worker shortage’ narrative just got a reality check. Funny how those ‘help wanted’ signs disappear when free money dries up.

Fed cuts rates as hiring slowdown spreads

Instead of BLS data, the focus turned to August’s JOLTS report, which already showed the market losing steam, with openings at 7.23 million, flat from July, but still 7% lower than January.

That was before the shutdown slowed everything down even more. Indeed’s platform has shown the same pattern: job ads are shrinking, and employers are offering smaller pay increases. In August, salary offerings were only up 2.5% year-over-year. That’s weaker than the 3.4% gain posted back in January.

All of this is starting to worry the Fed, which just now started to cut interest rates again, after nearly a year of nothing.

In October, the Federal Open Market Committee voted 10–2 to cut its benchmark interest rate by 25 basis points, bringing it to a range of 3.75% to 4%. The reason? Inflation is still hovering about 1% above their 2% target, but the labor market looks worse.

Fed Governor Lisa Cook made that pretty clear on Monday. She said, “Hiring is slowing. We see this from Indeed, from job postings. We’re looking at a panoply of data, and those are real time. We’re not waiting on the unemployment report. There’s reason to be concerned, because there’s a slight uptick in the unemployment rate over the summer.”

We were also supposed to get the nonfarm payrolls report this Friday, but yeah—that’s canceled too. Dow Jones surveyed a group of economists who predicted we would’ve seen a 60,000 drop in jobs for October and a rise in the unemployment rate to 4.5%.

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