Wage Pressures Could Be Building

The Conference Board's Help-Wanted Advertising Index advanced to 90 in February, up three points from January. The figure was 82 one year ago.

In the last three months, help-wanted advertising rose in six regions and fell in three. The largest increase was in the Middle Atlantic region (16.0%). It was followed by the Pacific (6.8%), East North Central (3.5%) and South Atlantic (3.2%). Declines were in the New England (!9.8%), East South Central (!2.2%) and Mountain (!2.5%) regions.

The job market continues to show surprising strength, says Conference Board Economist Ken Goldstein. A pickup in job growth mixed with slowing layoffs suggests the labor market is about to become even tighter. While that is good news for job seekers, employers face the prospect of having to offer higher wages to attract quality job candidates.

Goldstein added that job growth is unlikely to slow to an average of 200,000 new jobs per month, even with a new and more restrictive monetary policy in place. Sustained job growth and slight advances in hourly compensation have been the dominant trend in the labor market, spurring consumer confidence.

The Conference Board surveys help-wanted advertising volume in 51 major newspapers across the country every month. Because ad volume has proven to be sensitive to labor market conditions, this measure provides a gauge of change in the local, regional, or national supply of jobs.

Latest Seasonally-Adjusted Results

	Feb 97	Jan 97	Dec 96	Feb 96
National Index	90	87	85	82
Proportion of Labor Markets with Rising Want-Ad Volume	80%	47%	35%	45%
Unemployment Rate	5.3%	5.4%	5.3%	5.5%

March 27, 1997 The Conference Board

Added to the WWW 04-15-97
Last updated on 04-15-97

Hosted by:
One Crossroads Place
610 West Maple Ave, Suite WWW
Independence, MO 64050
(816) 252-4080
sysop@kcmo.com

wmeubank@ocp.kcmo.com