Jobs, Labor Market | featured news

The resurgent U.S. housing market has sent builders calling again for Richard Vap, who owns a drywall installation company. Vap would love to help - if he could hire enough qualified people. "There is a shortage of manpower," says Vap, owner of South Valley Drywall in Littleton, Colo. "We're probably only hiring about 75 or 80 percent of what we actually need."

The number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits fell to the lowest level in more than five years, a positive signal for the labor market ahead of Friday's April jobs report.

U.S. employers added 157,000 jobs in January, and hiring was much stronger at the end of 2012 than previously thought, providing reassurance that the job market held steady even as economic growth stalled.

Private-sector employers added 192,000 jobs in January, more than economists were expecting, in a sign of growth in the labor market, a report by a payrolls processor showed on Wednesday.

The number of people seeking unemployment benefits fell last week by 8,000 to a seasonally adjusted 355,000, a possible sign of a healing job market. But officials cautioned that the figures were distorted by Superstorm Sandy.

U.S. companies added 158,000 jobs in October, data from a payrolls processor showed on Thursday in a revamped report on the private sector labor market. The historical data for the ADP National Employment Report was revised as part of the new methodology, which was used for the first time in the October report. September's increase has halved to 88,200 new jobs from an initially reported 162,000.

The number of U.S. job openings fell slightly in August, a troubling sign for a labor market that is recovering at a painfully slow pace. Job openings - a measure of labor demand - dropped to 3.56 million from 3.59 million in July, the Labor Department said on Wednesday in its monthly Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey. The data casts a small shadow over recent signs of improvement in the labor market.

Companies added 162,000 jobs in September, more than economists expected but still pointing to slow improvement in the labor market, data from a payrolls processor showed on Wednesday.

Orders for long-lasting U.S. manufactured goods dropped sharply in August suggesting the main engine of economic growth was stalling, offsetting hopeful signs of an improvement in the labor market.

The number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits plunged 26,000 last week to a seasonally adjusted 359,000, a hopeful sign for the job market. It's the lowest level of weekly applications in nine weeks.