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America capped off an extraordinary year for job growth, adding 223,000 positions in December | CNN Business

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CNN
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The US economy added 223,000 jobs in December, according to the monthly employment report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, capping a year of extraordinary job growth and marking the second-best year for the labor market in records that go back to 1939.

The unemployment rate fell back to a record low of 3.5% from a revised 3.6% in November.

Economists were expecting 200,000 job gains for the last month of the year, according to Refinitiv. December’s job total is lower than the downwardly revised 256,000 jobs added in November.

Including last month’s gains, which are subject to revision, the economy added about 4.5 million jobs in 2022. That’s the second-highest-ever total, after the 6.7 million jobs added in 2021 — a boomerang from 2020’s 9.3 million job losses.

The labor market slowed in 2022, compared to the previous year’s tear. December’s jobs total represents the lowest monthly gains in two years.

Those latest gains come following months of jumbo interest rate increases from the Federal Reserve in its attempt to cool off the economy after inflation last year hit its highest level since the 1980s. Those efforts have, so far, remained mostly elusive.

That means the Fed is entering 2023 looking for a considerably softer and looser labor market — notably, increased labor participation, a better alignment of job seekers to open positions, and lower levels of wage growth.

“This is about the best report one could hope for, given a still very hot US labor market,” said Joe Brusuelas, principal and chief economist for RSM US.

Wall Street responded positively to Friday’s jobs data, with the Dow rising by almost 500 points by mid-morning — mostly a reaction to the slower pace of wage growth. Average hourly earnings increased 0.3% over the previous month and 4.6% annually. That’s compared to 0.4% month-on-month growth in November and 4.8% annual growth.

The December report showed that the labor force participation rate, an estimation of the active workforce and people looking for work, ticked up to 62.3% from 62.2%.

Labor force participation rates have been on a decline — largely due to demographic changes and aging Baby Boomers — since hitting a high of 67.3% in early 2000, and had fallen to 63.3% in the month before the onset of the pandemic. The participation rate has not returned to pre-pandemic levels, vexing economists and the Fed, while also contributing to an imbalance of worker supply and demand.

“The labor market is moving in the right direction for the Federal Reserve, according to the December employment report, but is not there yet,” Gus Faucher, senior economist for PNC Financial services said in a statement. “Job growth is slowing to a more sustainable pace, and wage growth is softening as demand in the job market slackens somewhat.”

However, with job growth well above pre-pandemic levels, when job gains averaged 164,000 in 2019, and the unemployment rate returning to a 50-year low, there is little indication that there will be enough of a boost in the labor force to help cool off the job market, he said.

Some of the largest monthly gains were in industries such as leisure and hospitality, health care, and accommodation and food services, which all were hit hard during the pandemic. There were also notable monthly job losses in technology and interest-rate-sensitive sectors that surged during the pandemic and are now rebalancing as consumers shift spending toward services.

Industries such as information, finance and professional and business services, shed jobs between November and December.

The losses seen in areas such as professional and business services are likely an effect of the waves of mass layoffs hitting the tech industry, said Ken Kim, a senior economist at KPMG.

“We are seeing a little bit of spread to other areas,” he said.

In addition to Friday’s strong jobs numbers, several other pieces of jobs data released this week continue to reflect a healthy labor market. Wednesday’s Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) report showed that the number of available jobs remained steady at 10.5 million in November. It also showed that quits, layoffs and hires didn’t really show any major signs of cooling that month.

ADP’s private-sector employment report on Thursday also showed a robust labor market, with 235,000 jobs added in the private sector during December, well exceeding expectations of 150,000.

And Thursday’s weekly jobless claims fell by 21,000 to 204,000 for the week ending November 26, while continuing claims decreased to 1.69 million from 1.72 million to 1.61 million.

—CNN’s Matt Egan contributed to this report.

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January 6, 2023
US job openings totaled 10.5 million in November, more than expected | CNN Business

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Minneapolis
CNN
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The number of available jobs in the United States totaled 10.46 million in November, according to data released Wednesday by the Department of Labor.

That’s more than the 10 million total job openings that economists were expecting, according to Refinitiv, and slightly lower than the upwardly revised October total of 10.51 million.

“The US labor market remains on fire,” Nick Bunker, head of economic research for Indeed Hiring Lab, said in a statement about the latest Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, or JOLTS. “The flames may have receded a bit from the highs of the initial reopening of the economy, but demand for workers remains robust and workers are seizing new opportunities.”

There were still about 1.7 job openings for each job seeker in November, unchanged from October, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The Federal Reserve closely monitors this ratio, since tightness in the labor market means employees have greater leverage to seek higher wages, which in turn drives up inflation.

The robust number of job openings remains “a testament to the resilience of demand for labor on Main Street, even as job openings tumbled on Wall Street,” said Julia Pollak, chief economist with ZipRecruiter, in a tweet posted shortly after the report was released.

Job hiring inched down to 6.06 million in November from 6.11 million in October, according to the report. Layoffs fell to 1.35 million from 1.45 million, and the number of people quitting their job increased to 4.17 million from 4.05 million.

“The Great Resignation is far from over — quits surged in November, to 4.2 million,” Pollak said. “They have now been above 4 million for 18 straight months, after coming in at 3.4 million before the pandemic and averaging 2.6 million in the prior years.”

Although openings came in above expectations, the JOLTS report likely won’t spur a dramatic change in course from the Fed, economists for labor market analytics company Lightcast said during a webcast Wednesday morning.

“This report shows more positive signs for the economy than originally expected,” said Bledi Taska, Lightcast’s chief economist. “This was a very surprising report, but in some ways that’s positive for the economy overall. This report moves us from cautious to cautiously optimistic. I don’t expect to have to use the word recession any time soon.”

Labor turnover activity this month will provide a good window of where the labor market may be heading, Taska said, adding that he would expect layoff activity to rise but not to a point of where it would indicate a serious recession was taking hold.

The data comes ahead of the government’s closely watched monthly jobs report, which is set to be released on Friday and is expected to show that 200,000 jobs were added to the US economy in December.

While that number is slightly lower than in previous months, it caps off an unusually strong year for the labor market — all the more so, given the Fed’s efforts to slow the economy in order to rein in demand and inflation.

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January 4, 2023
Twitter accused of failing to pay millions in employee bonuses after Musk takeover | CNN Business

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CNN
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Twitter failed to pay out annual bonuses to staff after its acquisition by billionaire Elon Musk despite repeated assurances from executives in the lead-up to the deal closing that the company would do so, according to a new lawsuit filed on behalf of employees.

The lawsuit was filed in a San Francisco federal court on Tuesday by Mark Schobinger, who was a senior director of compensation at Twitter until he left the company late last month. The suit is seeking class action status for former and current Twitter employees who did not receive their 2022 bonus.

“We estimate about a couple thousand employees would have been eligible for the bonuses,” Shannon Liss-Riordan, the attorney representing Schobinger, said in a statement to CNN. “While I don’t have an exact number, we expect the amount owed is in the tens of millions.”

Twitter, which has cut much of is public relations team, did not respond to CNN’s request for comment.

The complaint states that after it was announced that Musk was acquiring the social media company last April, “many employees raised concerns” over the fate of “their compensation and annual bonus” if and when the deal closed.

In the months leading up to Musk completing his acquisition of Twitter, company executives repeatedly promised employees that 2022 bonuses would be paid out at 50% of the target, according to the complaint. “The promise was repeated following Musk’s acquisition,” the complaint said.

Despite the promises, however, Twitter has yet to pay out bonuses, the lawsuit says. Schobinger left the company last month following “Twitter’s reneging on various promises it had made to employees, including its failure to pay promised bonuses,” according to the complaint.

The lawsuit is the latest in a string of legal actions taken by former Twitter employees after Musk’s acquired the company and slashed 80% of the staff in an urgent bid to cut costs.

Liss-Riordan previously brought multiple proposed class action suits against Twitter, including on behalf of female employees and disabled employees. Another suit was filed by a group of former employees who accused Twitter of breach of contract because it allegedly failed to follow through on promises to allow remote work and provide consistent severance benefits after the acquisition.

Twitter has denied the breach of contract allegations in the lawsuit brought by former employees about remote work and severance. The proposed class action suits on behalf of female and disabled employees were dismissed by federal judges last month. The suits were later refiled.

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April 12, 2021
Dylan Mulvaney says Bud Light’s backlash response was ‘worse than not hiring a trans person at all’ | CNN Business

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New York
CNN
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Dylan Mulvaney on Thursday broke her silence about the fallout that occurred after the trans influencer made two Instagram posts sponsored by Bud Light earlier this year.

Bud Light’s sponsorship of an April 1 Instagram post by Mulvaney set off a firestorm of anti-trans backlash and calls for a boycott. Mulvaney herself also faced a wave of hate and violent threats.

Now, in a video posted to Instagram Thursday, Mulvaney is calling on Bud Light and other companies not only to work with trans and other queer influencers, but to support them through the process, even as trans rights are under fire across the country and corporations face anti-LGBTQ+ campaigns.

Mulvaney said she has “been scared to leave my house, and I have been ridiculed in public, I have been followed,” and she criticized Bud Light for not standing by her and the partnership. She said the company never reached out to her in the wake of the backlash.

“For a company to hire a trans person and then not publicly stand by them is worse in my opinion than not hiring a trans person at all because it gives customers permission to be as transphobic and hateful as they want,” Mulvaney said. “And the hate doesn’t end with me, it has serious and grave consequences for the rest of our community.”

When the backlash ignited in April, Bud Light first responded with a straightforward explanation of its relationship with social media influencers like Mulvaney. But later it released a vague statement from the CEO that failed to offer support for Mulvaney or the trans community. Bud Light sales dropped in the ensuing weeks, the company lost its top rating from a major LGBTQ+ nonprofit and it placed two marketing executives on leave.

The controversy over the sponsored posts came as trans rights are under attack. Over 400 anti-LGBTQ+ bills were introduced in state legislatures this year through April 3, according to American Civil Liberties Union, including ones restricting access to gender-affirming care for trans youth. Generally, transgender people are more than four times as likely to be victims of violent crime than cisgender people, according to a study from the UCLA School of Law.

The Bud Light backlash also coincided with anti-LGBTQ+ campaigns against other big brands, including Target.

Mulvaney’s statement followed a Wednesday appearance by Brendan Whitworth, CEO of Bud Light owner Anheuser-Busch, on CBS Mornings, in which he repeated the company’s recent statements about wanting to “focus on what we do best, which is brewing great beer for everyone,” and did not directly answer a question about whether the campaign was a mistake.

“I think the conversation surrounding Bud Light has moved away from beer, and the conversation has become divisive, and Bud Light really does not belong there, Bud Light should be about bringing people together,” Whitworth said.

In her video, Mulvaney appeared to address that sentiment, saying, “supporting trans people, it shouldn’t be political.”

“There should be nothing controversial or divisive about working with us, and I know it’s possible because I’ve worked with some fantastic companies who care,” Mulvaney said. “But caring about the LGBTQ+ community requires a lot more than just a donation somewhere during Pride month.”

She added: “We’re customers, too, I know a lot of trans and queer people who love beer.”

In a statement responding to Mulvaney’s video, an Anheuser-Busch spokesperson told CNN on Thursday that, “we remain committed to the programs and partnerships we have forged over decades with organizations across a number of communities, including those in the LGBTQ+ community. The privacy and safety of our employees and our partners is always our top priority. As we move forward, we will focus on what we do best — brewing great beer for everyone and earning our place in moments that matter to our consumers.”

–CNN’s Danielle Wiener-Bronner contributed to this report.

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April 12, 2021
Job site ZipRecruiter cutting 20% of its staff | CNN Business

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New York
CNN
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Fewer employers looking for workers means 270 employees at job search site ZipRecruiter will soon be out of a job.

The company is cutting 20% of its staff by the end of this month, the company disclosed in a filing late Wednesday.

“This action was taken in response to current market conditions and after reducing other discretionary expenses, with a view toward driving long-term efficiency,” according to the filing.

The company had previously said it is experiencing a “typical softness in jobs posting” in January, but sounded other alarms about a slowing in the labor market. Its first quarter revenue fell 19% from a year earlier and it forecast that its revenue in the current quarter would be down nearly 30% from the second quarter of 2022.

The job search site still projects adjusted earnings that are roughly the same for this year as last year, although it said to do so it would “respond to our environment quickly” by “increasing our focus on profitability during times of decreased demand from employers.”

About half of the 270 employees losing their job are in the sales and customer support teams. The company will take a charge of between $7 million to $9 million to cover severance costs. It expects to still make the same level of profits, excluding special items such as severance, as in its earlier guidance.

It also announced that CEO Ian Siegel agreed to a 30% cut in base salary, as of June 1. He has a base salary of $550,000, according to an earlier filing, but had total compensation last year of about twice that amount.

Layoffs across the tech sector have become widespread in recent months. Amazon, one of the nation’s largest private-sector employers, has announced two rounds of job cuts this year totaling 27,000 positions, and Facebook holding company Meta has announced 21,000 job cuts since last fall. Alphabet, Microsoft and Salesforce — and especially Twitter — have all announced large job cuts.

Outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas said Thursday there have been 137,000 layoffs in the sector in the first five months of the year, the most job cuts in the sector since there were 168,000 in all of 2001, the year after the dot.com bubble burst.

Despite all the job cuts in technology and also in media, US employers overall are still hiring more people than they’re cutting.

Private sector employment increased by 278,000 jobs in May, according to ADP’s monthly National Employment Report released Thursday, much stronger than the 170,000 forecast by economists. Economists are also forecasting a gain of 190,000 jobs for May when the Labor Department issues its monthly jobs report Friday. The April jobs report also came in much stronger than expected, as employers added 253,000 jobs.

Still, hiring is at a slower pace than a year ago, when employers added 445,000 jobs a month, on average, in the first half of 2022. The Labor Department’s count of job openings, while up 3% in April compared to March, is down 14% from a year earlier — though that still means there are 1.8 jobs available for every job seeker.

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April 12, 2021
Silicon Valley escalates the battle over returning to the office | CNN Business

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Three years after Silicon Valley companies led the charge for embracing remote work in the early days of the pandemic, the tech industry is now escalating the fight to bring employees back into the office -— and igniting tensions with staff in the process.

Google, which has long been a bellwether for workplace policies in the tech industry and beyond, frustrated some employees this week by announcing plans to begin more strictly enforcing its policy that requires workers in-office at least three days a week. The updated policy includes tracking office badge attendance and possibly factoring it into performance reviews, according to CNBC, citing internal memos.

“Overnight, workers’ professionalism has been disregarded in favor of ambiguous attendance tracking practices tied to our performance evaluations,” Chris Schmidt, a software engineer at Google and member of the grassroots Alphabet Workers Union, told CNN in a statement. “The practical application of this new policy will be needless confusion amongst workers and a disregard for our various life circumstances.”

In a statement, Ryan Lamont, a Google spokesperson, told CNN that its policy of working in the office three days a week is “going well, and we want to see Googlers connecting and collaborating in-person, so we’re limiting remote work to exception only.”

Lamont said that company leaders can see reports showing how their teams are adopting the hybrid work model, including “aggregated data” on badge swipes. He added that now that the company is more than a year into its hybrid model, “we’re formally integrating this approach into all of our workplace policies.”

Google isn’t alone in facing pushback from employees. Other tech companies are also grappling with how best to compel workers to come into the office after they’ve grown accustomed to greater flexibility. The tug-of-war is compounded by the fact that tech companies have laid off tens of thousands of employees over the past year, leveling a major blow to employee morale.

At Amazon, tensions boiled over last week as hundreds of office workers staged a walkout to call attention to their grievances, including the three-day return-to-office mandate that was implemented in May.

A current Amazon worker who spoke at the walkout said that she started an internal Slack channel called “remote advocacy” because she wanted a space where workers could discuss how the new return-to-office policy would impact their lives.

“Before I realized what was happening, that channel had 33,000 people in it,” the worker, who identified only as Pamela, said to the crowd at the event. Pamela called the Slack channel advocating for remote work “the largest concrete expression of employee dissatisfaction in our entire company history.”

But the employee criticism isn’t stopping tech companies, who have spent billions on sprawling campuses over the years and often preach the value of serendipitous workplace interactions, from moving forward with their return to office policies.

In response to the walkout, Amazon previously told CNN it may “take time” for some workers to adjust to being in the office more days. But the company also said it’s “happy with how the first month of having more people back in the office has been” and touted the extra “energy, collaboration, and connections happening” in the office.

Facebook-parent Meta similarly doubled down last week on its push to get workers in the office, warning that employees currently assigned to an office must return to in-person work three days a week starting this September. (A Meta spokesperson told CNN the updated policy was not set in stone, and employees designated as remote workers will be allowed to keep their remote status).

At least one tech company is taking a gentler approach.

Salesforce is trying to lure staff into offices by offering to donate $10 to a local charity for each day an employee comes in from June 12 to June 23, according to an internal Slack message reported on by Fortune.

A Salesforce spokesperson told CNN: “Giving back is deeply embedded in everything we do, and we’re proud to introduce Connect for Good to encourage employees to help us raise $1 Million+ for local nonprofits.”

But it might take more than temporary charitable contributions to convince some workers it’s worthwhile to return. Schmidt, the software engineer at Google, said that even if you go into the office, there’s no guarantee you’ll have people on your team to work with or even a desk to sit at.

“Many teams are distributed, and for some of us there may not be anyone to collaborate with in our physical office locations,” Schmidt said. “Currently, New York City workers do not even have enough desks and conference rooms for workers to use comfortably.”

“A one size fits all policy does not address these circumstances,” he added. “We deserve a voice in shaping the policies that impact our lives to establish clear, transparent and fair working conditions for all of us.”

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April 12, 2021