U.S. job openings slipped to 7.1 million in August but labor market remains sturdy

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WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. employers posted fewer job openings in August, but the American labor market remains resilient in the face of higher energy costs caused by the fighting with Iran.

U.S. job openings slid to 7.08 million from a revised 7.34 million in July, the Labor Department reported Tuesday. Openings came in below the 7.2 million that forecasters had expected and were the lowest since they hit 6.9 million in March.

The department's Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) also showed that layoffs fell and the number of people quitting their jobs — a sign of confidence in their prospects — retreated slightly in August. The JOLTS report's measure of gross hiring — before subtracting people who quit or lost their jobs — ticked up modestly in August but remains at low levels.

The U.S. job market is sturdy, though unspectacular, despite an energy shock from the Iran war. Hiring has rebounded from a miserable 2025. Employers — businesses, nonprofits and government agencies — have added an average 80,000 jobs a month so far this year. That is an improvement on the 9,700-a-month average last year when high interest rates and uncertainty about President Donald Trump's trade policies discouraged businesses from hiring.

Still, Americans’ confidence in the economy has sunk to the lowest level in more than a decade, according to the monthly index released Tuesday by the Conference Board.

When the Labor Department releases its next jobs report on Friday, it is expected to show that the United States added 95,000 net jobs in September, solid but down from a surprising 162,000 in August. The unemployment rate likely stayed a low 4.1% as most American workers enjoy an unusual degree of job security, according to a survey of forecasters by the data firm FactSet.

Employers may not be laying workers off, but they aren't hiring nearly as many as they did a few years ago. Hiring remains well below the 166,000 monthly jobs created, on average, in 2023 and 2024, and the 491,000 a month recorded during the 2021-2022 hiring boom that followed COVID-19 lockdowns.

Cory Stahle, senior economist at the Indeed jobs website, said the labor market is "far less dynamic than it was a few years ago. It’s a comfortable place to be if you already have a job. It’s a frustrating one if you’re trying to find one, especially for new graduates and others entering the workforce.''