Online Job Demand Down 83,200 in October, The Conference Board Reports

-- September and October dips in job demand point to continued weakness in the
labor market

NEW YORK, Nov. 2 /PRNewswire/ -- Online advertised vacancies declined by
83,200 to 3,280,000 in October, according to The Conference Board Help-Wanted
OnLine Data Series (HWOL)(TM) released today.

Online labor demand has been relatively flat since the low point in April
2009, increasing a modest 117,000, or slightly less than 20,000/month. The
October decline reflected dips in labor demand across much of the nation.

"The September and October numbers are a further indication that, thus far,
the recovery is weak," said Gad Levanon, Senior Economist at The Conference
Board. "Labor demand is a leading indicator of employment, and the numbers
indicate that employment is not likely to rise for the rest of this year."
While there are fewer layoffs and some states, like Maryland and New York,
have a modestly upward trend, overall the labor market remains quite anemic.
"The gap between the number of unemployed and the number of advertised
vacancies is about 11.8 million, with 4.5 unemployed for every online
advertised vacancy," said Levanon.

Regional and State Highlights

-- New York and New Jersey both show a modest upward trend in job demand
-- In the South, job trend is positive in Georgia, Maryland, North
Carolina
and Virginia

-- Trend in job demand is basically flat in the largest states in the
West

In the South, October online advertised vacancies fell by 28,500, following a
45,400 September loss. All of the most populous Southern states decreased.
Texas dropped by 7,900 in October; its September and October drops more than
offset its August gain. Florida, which in September had dropped 9,400, dropped
another 8,300 in October. With respect to the longer-term trends among the
larger states in the South, Texas and Florida are basically flat while job
demand in Georgia, Virginia, North Carolina and Maryland has turned up. Since
January 2009, advertised vacancies in Florida have been basically flat, rising
less than 7,000. Among the less populous states in the South, in October
Louisiana decreased by 1,700, Arkansas decreased by 1,200, Kentucky decreased
by 1,000, Alabama and West Virginia increased modestly (400 and 100
respectively), and advertised vacancies in Oklahoma remained unchanged.

The Northeast was the region with the smallest decline in October, down 6,000,
where dips in some of the larger states were partially offset by gains in the
states with smaller populations. New Jersey showed the largest decrease, down
4,700 to 126,200, in October. Massachusetts decreased by 2,800 to 102,400.
Online job demand in New York, which has shown relative strength in labor
demand since April 2009, dipped by 700 in October. Pennsylvania decreased by
1,800 to 124,200. Among the states with smaller populations, in October
Connecticut increased by 1,200, Rhode Island increased by 700, and Maine
increased modestly (300). Vermont decreased modestly (300), and New Hampshire
remained unchanged.

In the West, California fell by 3,700 in October. Arizona dropped 3,400 in
October while Washington and Colorado dropped slightly (700 and 500
respectively). In spite of the October declines, the trend for all of the most
populous states in the West is basically flat. Among the states with smaller
populations, New Mexico and Nevada fell 2,200 and 600 respectively while
Hawaii rose by 700.

In the Midwest, Illinois declined by 7,400 in October. Ohio, which lost 1,900
in September, lost another 2,900 in October. Missouri lost 2,000 and fell to
its lowest level since April. Michigan gained a modest 200, and Wisconsin
remained unchanged.

The Supply/Demand rate for the U.S. in September (the latest month for which
unemployment numbers are available) was at 4.50, up slightly from 4.31 in
August and indicating that there are now 4.5 unemployed workers for every
online advertised vacancy. Among the states, the highest Supply/Demand rate
continues to be in Michigan (10.60), where there are nearly 11 unemployed
people for every advertised vacancy. Other states where there are over 6
unemployed for every advertised vacancy are Kentucky (7.32), Mississippi
(6.56), California (6.14), and Indiana (6.11). States with some of the lowest
rates include: Nebraska (1.62) and Alaska (1.63), Virginia (1.92) and Maryland
(1.94).

It should be noted that the Supply/Demand rate only provides a measure of
relative tightness of the individual state labor markets and does not suggest
that the occupations of the unemployed directly align with the occupations of
the advertised vacancies.

OCCUPATIONAL HIGHLIGHTS

-- Labor demand for Sales professions and Business and Finance
occupations
rises in October

-- Demand for both healthcare practitioners and healthcare support
occupation drops in October

Among the top 10 occupations in October with online advertised vacancies,
Sales and Related occupations, which have remained relatively flat over the
last six months, experienced the largest gain, rising 46,100 in October. Job
demand was up in a wide variety of sales functions including retail sales
workers, first-line supervisors of non-retail sales workers, and financial
services sales agents. Business and Finance, which declined throughout this
year, increased 21,800 in October, in large part reflecting an increased
demand for management analysts. Computer and Mathematical Science occupations
rose 7,200 to 409,200, with increased demand for computer systems engineers.
An increase in online advertised vacancies for executive secretaries,
administrative assistants, and medical secretaries contributed to the 3,200
increase in the Office and Administrative Support occupations.

Healthcare Practitioners and Technical occupations, the largest category in
terms of volume, dropped 68,900 in October to 535,600. Labor demand for
Healthcare Support occupations also declined in October, down 9,400 to
104,400. Healthcare is a broad field, and the relative tightness of the labor
market varies substantially from the higher-paying practitioner and technical
jobs to the lower-paying support occupations. In September, the last month for
which unemployment data are available, for every unemployed person looking for
work in a practitioner or technical occupation, there were 2.7 advertised
vacancies and the average wage in these occupations is $32.64/hour. In
healthcare support occupations, where the average wage is $12.66, there were
over two unemployed for every advertised vacancy.

Advertised vacancies in Management occupations were down 56,000 in October to
353,700. Individual occupations showing the largest decreases included
managers in a variety of areas, including sales managers and managers for
computer and information systems, human resources, medical and health
services, and postsecondary education administrators. The number of unemployed
exceeds the number of advertised vacancies, and in September there were over
two unemployed (2.04) for every online advertised vacancy in the management
field.

Supply/Demand rates indicated that, among the occupations with the largest
number of online advertised vacancies, there is a significant difference in
the number of unemployed seeking positions in these occupations. Among the top
ten occupations advertised online, there were more vacancies than unemployed
people seeking positions for Healthcare Practitioners (0.4) and Computer and
Mathematical Science (0.6). On the other hand, in Sales and Related
Occupations, there were four people seeking jobs in this field for every
online advertised vacancy (3.99) and there were nearly six unemployed looking
for work in Office and Administrative Support positions for every advertised
opening (5.6).

METRO AREA HIGHLIGHTS

-- Washington, DC, Salt Lake City, and Baltimore have the lowest
Supply/Demand rates

-- Online advertised vacancies in Washington, DC are at last year's
levels

In October, all of the 52 metropolitan areas for which data are reported
separately posted over-the-year decreases in the number of online advertised
vacancies. Among the three metro areas with the largest numbers of advertised
vacancies, the New York metro area was 10 percent below its October 2008 level
and the Los Angeles metro area was about 22 percent below its October 2008
level. Washington, D.C. was down 200, roughly in line with last year's level.

The number of unemployed exceeded the number of advertised vacancies in all of
the 52 metro areas for which information is reported separately. Washington,
D.C., Salt Lake City, and Baltimore were the locations with the most favorable
supply/demand rates, where the number of unemployed looking for work was only
slightly larger than the number of advertised vacancies. On the other hand,
metro areas in which the respective number of unemployed is substantially
above the number of online advertised vacancies include Detroit, MI, where
there are nearly 12 unemployed people for every advertised vacancy (11.9),
Riverside (10.3), Miami (6.5), Los Angeles (5.5), Sacramento (5.5), Louisville
(5.1), and Memphis (5.1). Supply/Demand rate data are for September 2009, the
latest month for which unemployment data for local areas are available.

PROGRAM NOTES

The Conference Board Help-Wanted Online Data Series(TM) measures the number of
new, first-time online jobs and jobs reposted from the previous month on more
than 1,200 major Internet job boards and smaller job boards that serve niche
markets and smaller geographic areas.

Like The Conference Board's long-running Help-Wanted Advertising Index of
print ads (which was published for over 55 years and discontinued in September
2008 but continues to be available for research), the new online series is not
a direct measure of job vacancies. The level of ads in both print and online
may change for reasons not related to overall job demand.

With the October 1, 2008 release, HWOL began providing seasonally adjusted
data for the U.S., the 9 Census regions and 50 States. Seasonally adjusted
data for occupations was provided beginning with the July 1, 2009 release.
This data series, for which the earliest data is May 2005, continues to
publish not seasonally adjusted data for 52 large metropolitan areas, but it
is The Conference Board's intent to provide seasonally adjusted data for large
metro areas in the future.

People using this data are urged to review the information on the database and
methodology available on The Conference Board website and contact the
economists listed at the top of this release with questions and comments.
Background information and technical notes on this new series are available
at: http://www.conference-board.org/economics/helpwantedOnline.cfm.

The underlying data for this series is provided by Wanted Technologies
Corporation. Additional information on the Bureau of Labor Statistics data
used in this release can be found on the BLS website, www.bls.gov.

The Conference Board
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the world's leading organizations with the practical knowledge they need to
improve their performance and better serve society. The Conference Board is a
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the United States.

WANTED Technologies Corporation.
WANTED is a leading supplier of real-time sales and business intelligence
solutions for the media classified and recruitment industries. Using its
proprietary On-Demand data mining, lead generation and CRM (Customer
Relationship Management) integrated technologies, WANTED aggregates real-time
data from thousands of online job boards, real estate and newspaper sites, as
well as corporate Web sites on a daily basis.

WANTED's data is used to optimize sales and to implement marketing strategies
within the classified ad departments of major media organizations, as well as
by staffing firms, advertising agencies and human resources specialists. For
more information, please visit: http://www.wantedtech.com.

SOURCE The Conference Board

Frank Tortorici, +1-212-339-0231, or Gad Levanon, +1-212-339-0317, or June
Shelp, +1-212-339-0369, all of The Conference Board