Still, unemployment remains high — 7.3 percent in Ohio and 7 percent in Butler County— and many openings have gone unfilled for months.
John Blowbis, an economics professor at Miami University, said many employers remain skittish about adding new workers in a slow-growing economy, and others have struggled to find qualified workers.
“There’s still a lot of uncertainty about the economy, including the (impact) of the health care bill, the fiscal cliff (pending government spending cuts and tax increases), and the crisis in Europe that continue to make businesses cautious,” Blowbis said.
That caution was reflected in The Conference Board’s supply/demand calculations, which showed that for every online job opening last month there were about 2.3 unemployed workers in Ohio. Nationally, the ratio was 2.7 unemployed workers for every vacancy, which rose by 232,000 to 4.95 million.
“Labor demand is only half the story,” said June Shelp, vice president of The Conference Board. “The increased number of online advertised vacancies in all categories made the search for jobs easier, but looking for work was still a struggle for many job seekers.”
In the Cincinnati region the occupations with the most online job listings in May included truck drivers (1,222); retail salespersons (826); supervisors/managers (784); and customer service representatives (644).
Employers with the most ads included IBM (737); Mercy Health Partners (313); Staples (303); and Fifth Third Bank (295).
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