Dive Brief:
- The Conference Board’s Employment Trends Index grew in July, suggesting that there may be “continued resilience in the labor market,” Conrad Qi, an economic data scientist associate at The Conference Board, said in a Monday release.
- The composite index for payroll employment declined in May and June, but increased last month following an upwardly revised June reading. The rebound occurred “despite the 'low-hire, low-fire' backdrop,” Qi said
- Nonetheless, the growth left the index only 0.6% above where it was a year ago, signaling that “payroll growth may remain modest in the months ahead,” Qi said.
Dive Insight:
Multiple factors have made an already complex job market even more volatile this year. Those included “seasonal education worker cuts and normalizing leisure and hospitality hiring after the FIFA World Cup, which lowered non-farm payrolls by 23,000 in July,” per the report.
The index’s largest negative factor was a July increase in the share of involuntary part-time workers, although industrial production also had a negative impact.
Meanwhile, Qi said there was “modest but positive” job growth.
“Positive contributions to the ETI were led by the share of small firms reporting that jobs are ‘not able to be filled right now’ and initial claims for unemployment insurance,” Qi said. “The small firm measure rose 4 percentage points to 36% in July from 32% in June, its highest level since June 2025 — an indication that small businesses are seeking to hire more people.”
Job openings increased by an estimated 168,000 to 7.53 million, which also positively contributed to the index, while real manufacturing and trade sales increased by an estimated 0.2%.
Furthermore, the percentage of consumers who told The Conference Board’s Consumer Confidence Survey in July that “jobs are hard to get” fell to 21.5%, down from 21.7% in June.
A recent report from Resume.org found that while 92% of companies said they plan to hire in 2026, more than half expected layoffs due to AI (44%), reorganization/restructuring (42%) and budget constraints (39%). Organizations said they are specifically looking to hire workers who can demonstrate problem-solving skills, learn new tools and technologies quickly and have good communication skills.
