Online job ads fall in Utah and U.S.

Utah had fewer online advertised job vacancies in April than during the same month a year ago, according to a Conference Board report this week.

Utah was 20th in the nation, with an ad rate at 2.96 percent for April 2008, down almost 15 percent from the same period last year. The report said that ad rates represent the number of ads per 100 persons in the civilian labor force.

Nationally, there were 3.7 million online advertised job vacancies, a 16.4 percent decline from the April 2007. In addition, there were 2.4 advertised vacancies posted online for every 100 persons in the national labor force, down from a high of 2.9 in April 2007, the report said. It was the second straight month of year-over-year declines for the nation as a whole.

Alaska posted the highest ads rate in the nation for the eighth month in a row at 4.45 percent, while Mississippi had the lowest rate at 1.19 percent.

"The weakness in online advertised vacancies evident over the last few months deepened in April, and hiring is likely to continue to be lackluster into summer," said Conference Board economist Gad Levanon. "April is a month when we normally see employers increasing their recruitment, but this year, it actually declined."

In Salt Lake City, the amount of ads fell 15 percent from April 2007 to the same time this year. The 3.99 percent ad rate for the Salt Lake City metropolitan statistical area was 12th overall, despite declining nearly 18 percent year to year in April.

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E-mail: jlee@desnews.com

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