Nov. 1 (UPI) — There were 9.6 million U.S. job openings on the last business day of September, according to a Wednesday Bureau of Labor Statistics report.
Openings were up in accommodation and food services, arts, entertainment and recreation while job openings fell in other services, the federal government and information.
During September, 5.9 million people were hired and 5.5 million were separated from employment, according to the BLS. Within the separations, 3.7 million people quit their jobs while 1.5 million were laid off or fired.
The BLS said the number of people hired changed little for the third month in a row.
During September the number of people leaving jobs also didn’t change much. Job separations during the month declined in state and local government education and in non-durable goods manufacturing, but they increased in federal government employment.
The job quit rate also changed little over the last three months, staying at a rate of 2.3% of the employed workforce for the third straight month.
For small employers with one to nine employees job openings, hires and total separations didn’t change much. For large employers with 5,000 or more employees, the job openings rate went down in September.
According to ADP’s Wednesday National Employment Report, U.S. businesses added 110,000 jobs in October with education and healthcare accounting for 40% of the new hires.
Of those new jobs 45,000 were in education and healthcare while 17,000 were in hospitality.