The United States eQuest Employment Index showed a minimal gain in the month of April moving from 106.26 to 106.42.   The April gain was achieved with a small increase in overall job postings across most tracked industries but led by a large jump in the retail sector.  Energy and Healthcare continues to be the industries with the highest indices.  The Government industry was again the industry with the largest move down in the overall index rankings.

The top three Industries in the Unites States for overall job posting volume in April were Healthcare, Energy and Biotech.   Production and manufacturing-based industries continue to occupy the bottom of the Employment Index driven by a continued lack of a significant number of new positions being added to the marketplace and a consistent level of higher applicant traffic.  Geographically, all states continued to show growth but the largest growth numbers were within states already showing better hiring conditions.  The states with the highest hiring demand in April were Idaho, New Mexico and Washington while Missouri, Mississippi and Alabama continued to show the lowest demand indices.

The United Kingdom had a small downturn in April due to a reduction in job postings with steady applicant response rates.  The net result of these effects was an increase in the UK Index from 98.36 to 98.12.  While the number reflects a marginal overall decrease, the gap between locations that are hiring and those that lack job availability continue to grow.  Index values continue to vary widely in the UK ranging from 116.61 at the top to 80.05 at the low end of the spectrum.  Eden, East Devon and Ryedale again posted the highest overall demand values while Nottingham, Kingston upon Hull and Liverpool continued a more than year long position at the bottom of the regional list for candidate demand.  Even during a month of a UK downturn, London continues to show strong positive signs of growth with increased job volume and reasonable applicant traffic.

Credit: onrec.com