How Many People Are Fired or Laid Off Each Year in the United States? How Many People Are Fired Each Day in the United States?
(This article has been updated with data from the month of
February 2017.)
How many people are not working in the U.S.? How many adults are not working in the U.S.? Here!
Hold on... These numbers sound staggering:
An average of 54,549 people were laid off or fired EACH DAY (including weekends and holidays) in 2016. (19,965,000 people in total were laid off or fired in the 366 days of 2016.)
Monthly layoffs & discharges in thousands from the BLS JOLTS survey.
An average of 54,966 people have been laid off or fired each day (including weekends and holidays) in the first two months of 2017. A total of 3,243,000 people have been laid off or fired in the first 59 days of 2017 (through February).
These sound like big numbers, but the 2016 number is the LOWEST number of annual layoffs in the 16 years since 2001.
Where do these numbers come from?
The JOLTS report (Job Openings, Layoffs, and Turnover Survey), published monthly by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) tells us how many layoffs and "discharges" (generally firings for cause) in total were conducted in a given month, though it doesn't differentiate between people laid off due to a business closing, merger, or reduction in force vs. people who were fired for cause. It also doesn't distinguish between people laid off from seasonal jobs (such as construction or Christmas retail jobs) vs. people laid off because the whole company is reducing its work force or closing.
These numbers are available going back to the year 2001. As you can see on the chart below, the numbers of layoffs and discharges increased rapidly during the recession of 2007-2008, but decreased rapidly as well. The number of people being laid off has now been decreasing on a monthly basis since mid 2009. However, even the seasonally adjusted number of layoffs and discharges is volatile, meaning that it goes up and down quite a bit from one month to the next.
Also, when there are more jobs, there are, as a whole, more layoffs, but that didn't hold true in 2016. There were about 2.3 million more jobs in the United States in 2016 vs. 2015, and there were still more layoffs in 2015.
A
Annual Numbers of Layoffs:
Layoffs and discharges annually through 2016 with numbers of month-by-month layoffs for 2017-- compared with numbers of hires:
Layoffs Hires
- 2001: 24,499,000 62,588,000
- 2002: 22,922,000 58,469,000
- 2003: 23,294,000 57,027,000
- 2004: 22,668,000 60,222,000
- 2005: 22,243,000 63,107,000
- 2006: 20,896,000 63,501,000
- 2007: 21,958,000 62,123,000
- 2008: 24,028,000 54,740,000
- 2009: 26,444,000 46,242,000
- 2010: 21,633,000 48,686,000
- 2011: 20,689,000 50,237,000
- 2012: 21,053,000 52,358,000
- 2013: 19,944,000 54,212,000
- 2014: 20,405,000 58,653,000
- 2015: 20,972,000 62,054,000
- 2016: 19,965,000 62,789,000
- Jan 2017: 1,659,000 5,424,000
- Feb 2017: 1,584,000 5,314,000
- 2017 to date: 3,243,000 10,738,000
2016: An average of 172,025 people were HIRED EACH DAY in 2016. An average of 165,647 people left their jobs for any reason EACH DAY in 2016. Therefore, on average, 6,378 MORE people were hired each day in 2016 than left their jobs for any reason in 2016 and the number of jobs went up all year. Do the (simple) math, and we added about 2.3 million jobs in 2016.
As long as we have more people being hired than people leaving their jobs for any reason, the total number of jobs will continue to climb.
What about 2017?
In 2017 to date, 7,119 MORE people have been hired each day in 2017 than left their jobs for any reason each day in 2017. If this pace continues, we will add at about 2.6 million jobs this year.
So far in the early months of 2017:
- An average of 182,000 people were HIRED EACH DAY.
- An average of 174,881 people left their jobs for any reason each day so far in 2017.
- Of those 174,881 who left their jobs each day, an average of 54,966 left their jobs because they were fired or laid off.
- On average, 7,119 MORE people have been hired each day in 2017 than have left their jobs for any reason in 2017.
- 7,119 MORE hires over separations multiplied by 365 days in 2017, and, if this pace continues, we will add about 2.6 million more jobs this year.
- The greatest number of daily net hires over separations for any reason occurred in 2014, when 8,342 more people were hired each day than were separated each day for any reason. (By comparison, in 2009, there were about 14,000 MORE separations every day vs. hires.)
(This article has been updated with data from the month of
February 2017.)
How many people are not working in the U.S.? How many adults are not working in the U.S.? Here!
Hold on... These numbers sound staggering:
An average of 54,549 people were laid off or fired EACH DAY (including weekends and holidays) in 2016. (19,965,000 people in total were laid off or fired in the 366 days of 2016.)
An average of 54,549 people were laid off or fired EACH DAY (including weekends and holidays) in 2016. (19,965,000 people in total were laid off or fired in the 366 days of 2016.)
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| Monthly layoffs & discharges in thousands from the BLS JOLTS survey. |
An average of 54,966 people have been laid off or fired each day (including weekends and holidays) in the first two months of 2017. A total of 3,243,000 people have been laid off or fired in the first 59 days of 2017 (through February).
These sound like big numbers, but the 2016 number is the LOWEST number of annual layoffs in the 16 years since 2001.
The JOLTS report (Job Openings, Layoffs, and Turnover Survey), published monthly by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) tells us how many layoffs and "discharges" (generally firings for cause) in total were conducted in a given month, though it doesn't differentiate between people laid off due to a business closing, merger, or reduction in force vs. people who were fired for cause. It also doesn't distinguish between people laid off from seasonal jobs (such as construction or Christmas retail jobs) vs. people laid off because the whole company is reducing its work force or closing.
These numbers are available going back to the year 2001. As you can see on the chart below, the numbers of layoffs and discharges increased rapidly during the recession of 2007-2008, but decreased rapidly as well. The number of people being laid off has now been decreasing on a monthly basis since mid 2009. However, even the seasonally adjusted number of layoffs and discharges is volatile, meaning that it goes up and down quite a bit from one month to the next.
Also, when there are more jobs, there are, as a whole, more layoffs, but that didn't hold true in 2016. There were about 2.3 million more jobs in the United States in 2016 vs. 2015, and there were still more layoffs in 2015.
Also, when there are more jobs, there are, as a whole, more layoffs, but that didn't hold true in 2016. There were about 2.3 million more jobs in the United States in 2016 vs. 2015, and there were still more layoffs in 2015.
A
Annual Numbers of Layoffs:
Layoffs and discharges annually through 2016 with numbers of month-by-month layoffs for 2017-- compared with numbers of hires:
2016: An average of 172,025 people were HIRED EACH DAY in 2016. An average of 165,647 people left their jobs for any reason EACH DAY in 2016. Therefore, on average, 6,378 MORE people were hired each day in 2016 than left their jobs for any reason in 2016 and the number of jobs went up all year. Do the (simple) math, and we added about 2.3 million jobs in 2016.
As long as we have more people being hired than people leaving their jobs for any reason, the total number of jobs will continue to climb.
As long as we have more people being hired than people leaving their jobs for any reason, the total number of jobs will continue to climb.
What about 2017?
In 2017 to date, 7,119 MORE people have been hired each day in 2017 than left their jobs for any reason each day in 2017. If this pace continues, we will add at about 2.6 million jobs this year.
In 2017 to date, 7,119 MORE people have been hired each day in 2017 than left their jobs for any reason each day in 2017. If this pace continues, we will add at about 2.6 million jobs this year.
So far in the early months of 2017:
- An average of 182,000 people were HIRED EACH DAY.
- An average of 174,881 people left their jobs for any reason each day so far in 2017.
- Of those 174,881 who left their jobs each day, an average of 54,966 left their jobs because they were fired or laid off.
- On average, 7,119 MORE people have been hired each day in 2017 than have left their jobs for any reason in 2017.
- 7,119 MORE hires over separations multiplied by 365 days in 2017, and, if this pace continues, we will add about 2.6 million more jobs this year.
- The greatest number of daily net hires over separations for any reason occurred in 2014, when 8,342 more people were hired each day than were separated each day for any reason. (By comparison, in 2009, there were about 14,000 MORE separations every day vs. hires.)
"In terms of job openings, we only have data going back 15 years. The highest monthly averages in terms of job OPENINGS occurred in 2016, with an average of 5.7 million job openings a month. During the recovery of 2003-2007, we got up to an average of 4.5 million job openings a month in 2007."
ReplyDeleteOnly 2016? What is the average job openings between 2009-2016? So it is 5.7 mil. out of how many people in the prime working age group (25 to 54 years)? The prime working age group is a lot smaller in 2003, don't you think? It would be more accurate to use percentage of job openings / total americans in the prime working age group over at least 5 years (eg 2003-2007).
You continue to pick very few positive stats to fool the readers--selecting just the stats from the year 2016, etc. You really should take GDP stats over several years into account, not just monthly job openings data during just the recovery period.
Did you know under Obama only 74% of the prime working age participate in the labour force. Today, under Trump, it is at about 78.5%. The gdp and wage growth was terrible under Obama also.
http://money.cnn.com/2017/05/03/news/economy/trump-us-full-employment/index.html
Job openings are not broken down by age as we don't know how old someone is until someone is hired. I understand what you are saying, but coming up with a rate for prime-aged workers, but older and younger workers look for work as well. Hirings, layoffs, quits are not broken down by age. You can easily calculate some kind of rate, but you'd be using a number of job openings divided by a number of workers. It's not really the same.
DeleteThe number of job openings was much lower in the recession years of 2008 to about 2012. We averaged 2.4 million job openings a month in 2009; 3.2 in 2011 and 3.9 million job openings in 2013.
Yes, there is a RATE of job openings, the percentage of job openings relative to the total number of jobs, so we don't look at age of workers when calculating the rate. The Rate was 2.3 to 2.7 in 2003-2004. The rate was 3.0 to 3.4 in 2006 and 2007, then down to 1.7 and 1.8 in 2009, and then it started back up. In 2015 through 17, that rate has been the highest EVER, ranging from 3.5 to 4.0.
Thank you for the link to the CNN article. Believe it or not, but the CNN writer got a few things wrong in terms of how we calculate jobs numbers. If there is an email address, I will send her a correction. The issue is the number of people looking for full-time jobs. She assumes that all unemployed people are looking for full-time jobs; that is not true. She assumes that all people marginally attached to the labor force are looking for full-time jobs; that is also not true. In April (the article was written in early May, there were 5.6 people million unemployed and looking for full-time work and 5.2 million people working part-time but wanting full-time work. That's 10.8 million people who want full-time work, not the 14.4 "in need of a full-time job". The marginally attached people really cannot be counted. They haven't looked for work because they are ill, they have family responsibilities, they are in school or they are "not available to work now". It's wrong to assume that these people want full-time jobs.
DeleteWhere do you get your information? Faux news? The rightie blogs?
DeleteYou wrote: "Did you know under Obama only 74% of the prime working age participate in the labour force. Today, under Trump, it is at about 78.5%. The gdp and wage growth was terrible under Obama also." First, wage growth was NOT terrible under Obama. Look at the BLS CES050000031 chart. It shows that we FINALLY started to see a solid increase in inflation-adjusted wages for "regular" workers in about 2014. We are now back to where we were (in inflation-adjusted wages) in 1979, back before years of Reagan/Bush I economics. Inflation-adjusted wages hit a nadir in the late Bush I years, then climbed during the Clinton years, meandered during the Bush II and recession years, and finally started to go back up during Obama's second term. We are still in an Obama economy, and wages and jobs numbers are still going up.
You seem to claim that the employment participation of prime-aged workers has gone up 4% in the few months since Trump took office. Of course, that is not true. A year ago it was 78%, now it is 78.7%. The employment participation rate has been climbing slowly over the last several years, though it has been relatively stationary over the past 1-2 years.
"You continue to pick very few positive stats to fool the readers--selecting just the stats from the year 2016, etc. You really should take GDP stats over several years into account, not just monthly job openings data during just the recovery period." Looking at averages is very tricky. Obama inherited the worst economy in 80 years and it took us several years to dig ourselves out of the horrible recession. We can compare the economy at the end of Obama's tenure with where the economy was at the beginning of Obama's tenure, but why would you use an average when things were so bad in 2008-2009 even into 2010 and 2011?
Delete