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Maybe the economy can’t keep pumping out scores of new jobs each month with the unemployment rate scraping a 50-year low, but more Americans say it’s easier to find work now than anytime in the past 18 years.
Some 46.8% of the people surveyed in April as part of a report on consumer confidence say jobs were “plentiful.” That matches a post-recession peak from last November and undercuts the notion that the labor market has cooled off.
Read: Consumer confidence snaps back in April, pointing to steadily growing economy
By contrast, the share of Americans who said jobs were hard to get fell slightly to 13.3%. Nine years ago almost 50% of respondents said it was tough to find a job.
The gap between those who said jobs are plentiful and those who said they were hard to get widened to 33.5 points in April, just a hair shy of the post-recession top of 34.2 in November.
Read: Jobs report primed to show a rekindled economy, but not a sizzling one
A slew of labor-market indicators support the view that it’s a good time to look for work. The unemployment rate and pace of layoffs recently fell to 50-year lows and a chief complaint of business is a lack of skilled employees in a shrinking pool of talent.
Read: Consumer spending surges in March, but inflation remains tame
The government on Friday is slated to unveil hiring and unemployment figures for April. Economists polled by MarketWatch predict the U.S. gained 210,000 new jobs — enough to nudge the unemployment rate back down to match a post-recession low of 3.7%.
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